In the afternoon, Mu Sheng was practicing in the quiet room. Suddenly he heard that someone from the palace came to report that Guo Xuan was visiting, so he summoned him to the quiet room to meet him.
Not long after, Guo Xuan came to see him with a look of dust on his face.
Seeing that he was the only one coming, Mu Sheng asked, "Where is your brother? Haven't you found him yet?"
Guo Jue sighed and said: "Hey! Forget about the young master, it's really a trick of fate. I found him, but my brother actually fled to the grassland and joined the Dongyi people."
"How could Guo Huan think of defecting to the Dongyi people?"
Guo Xuan said: "Young master, you don't know something. Our Guo family started from the private salt business in Chendi for generations. More than 20 years ago, when the Chen Kingdom was not destroyed, our Guo family also acted as a smuggling agent for domestic dignitaries." The fur business was related to the various grassland tribes. At that time, in order to prosper the business, he had good friendship with the chiefs of the grassland tribes. Now that my brother has defected to the grassland, he has actually become a guest of King Dong Yi."
Mu Sheng heard this and said: "It seems that Guo Huan will not come to my temple."
Hearing this, Guo Jue said: "Yes! I persuaded my brother to come to join you, but King Dong Yi valued him very much and treated him well. My brother really couldn't forgive him, so he had no choice but to stay with King Dong Yi. It seems that it is destined that we two brothers can only work on separate sides and cannot work together..."
Mu Sheng sighed secretly when he heard the words, recalling the past, and sighed when he thought of all the past with him, but now things have changed...
Guo Xuan said again: "Master, Wu Xie has also heard about your affairs in Shanpou. In a few days, Mr. Wu will also come to Shanpou to meet you, Master."
When Mu Sheng heard this, he was a little surprised and said: "Are you Mr. Wu and you are here?"
Guo Jue nodded again and confirmed: "Well, you led the delegation of nations to visit the Central Plains not long ago. Mr. Wu just learned that you have established a foothold in Shanpu, so he wanted to come here to take a look."
Mu Sheng smiled and said: "Okay, very good. I will definitely greet Mr. Wu personally when the time comes."
In fact, when he visited Qingyang, he had already passed the news of the private meeting in Qingyang to Wu Xie through the intelligence agent Leqi, but he never received a response. Unexpectedly, not long after returning to Shanpupu, he received a message from Lao Wu. Information.
After a while, a palace official came to the quiet room to report: "I am reporting to the Emperor that there is an urgent military situation. The elders are already waiting to be summoned."
Mu Sheng turned to Guo Xuan and said, "Come with me to observe the meeting."
"No." Guo Xuan knew that Mu Sheng planned to bring him into the core decision-making circle of Shanpup in the future and entrust him with important responsibilities. This time he sat in on the imperial meeting to familiarize himself with the environment.
For the imperial meeting in the hall, Bortas and others had been waiting for a long time. They saw that there was another Central Plains person beside the emperor, but they did not take it seriously.
Mu Sheng pointed at Guo Xuan and introduced to them: "This Mr. Guo is a friend from the Central Plains that I invited to attend the imperial meeting. He will stay here as a guest minister from now on, and you will be ministers in the same palace from now on. "
Guo Xuan stepped forward and introduced himself: "I am from Zhongyuan, Chen County, and Yanggu County. My surname is Guo Xuan. I have met all the elders."
After hearing this, Bortas, Borzongbi, and Borjak came over to meet Guo Xuan. They understood that this person should be a close minister of the emperor in the future, and they naturally wanted to establish a good relationship with him.
After the ceremony, it was time to get down to business. Bortas stepped forward and handed Mu Sheng a military report: "Forefathers, this is about the military situation in Taisha. Please take a look."
Mu Sheng browsed through the information, and as he expected, the former Prime Minister Pamijia Takuba had used the information provided by the mountain puppets to spread the word that the current Prime Minister was a traitor. The reason why Taisha's army was defeated on the front line was because of Kunpatula provided information to the Jin army and the Shanpuppet coalition, which led to the defeat on the front line, and now the whole country of Taisha is in an uproar.
The current prime minister, Jakkunpatula, flatly denied this, claiming that it was Pamika Takuba's command error on the front line that led to the army's disastrous defeat. He did not punish you on the spot. It is because of the magnanimity of the current Emperor Taisha. Don't forget Anyway, if you still dare to wear your coat, you should ask Emperor Taisha to send all his troops to attack Kuli Bang.
The key now is that the attitude of the capital of Taisha is ambiguous. The two camps of the north and the south are engaged in a heated verbal war, but they have not yet reached the point of actually using weapons.
Mu Sheng raised his head and glanced at Bortas, Zongbi, and Yakes, and said, "What do you think? What is your opinion on the situation in Taisha now?"
Borzongbi stepped forward and said: "Ancestor, at present, the majority of the Tesha nobles support the current prime minister Jiakunpatula, and the minority supports Pamijia Takuba. But as far as I know, the former Prime Minister Takuba is very good at winning over allies, and although the current Prime Minister Jakkunpatula has many supporters, it is still unclear who will win if the two factions really fight!"
Mu Sheng nodded slightly and said: "The most important thing is to get them to fight as soon as possible. Just talking can't do it! Do you have any good ideas?"
Bortas stroked his beard, stepped forward and said: "To inform our ancestors, I think that the reason why they haven't started fighting yet is that they are only worried about foreign invasions from the north, such as our mountain puppets and the Xi tribe. Taisha has just experienced After a big defeat, they still need time to recover. If they are in civil strife in Taisha now, maybe we, the Shanpuppet and the Xi tribe, will send troops to take advantage of the situation again. All we have to do is to let Taisha relax and fight among themselves. "
Mu Sheng nodded in approval and said, "Tasi must be right."
Although the elder Borjak is the youngest among the three elders of the Bor family, he is also the most strategic. He stepped forward and said: "Old ancestor, I have an idea. I think we can send an envoy to contact the Xi clan and take the initiative. If we create border friction with the Xi people, there will be a conflict between our two countries, and the whole Taisha people will naturally feel free to fight among themselves."
Upon hearing this, Borzombi agreed: "What a good strategy. If our two families are to fight, everyone in Taisha will definitely relax their vigilance."
Bortas frowned and said: "Previously our army occupied the capital of Taisha. The Xi tribe thought that we were kidnapping Emperor Taisha and had the intention of completely annexing Taisha. The Xi tribe then launched an all-out attack on Taisha and spread the territory thousands of miles away, successfully taking over Taisha. In the three states of Sha, what the Xi Clan didn’t expect was that our army immediately withdrew its troops. Now the Xi Clan is riding a tiger and can’t get off. Now we are sending people to contact them. I guess the Xi Clan won’t trust us easily!”
Mu Sheng said: "The original intention was to provoke a conflict between Taisha and the Xi tribe, to prevent the two countries from collaborating to plot against us. Now the three parties lack mutual trust. Since we are going to fight, we must fight for it. There is no need to fight to the death. We can control the scale of the war, and it would be best if the Xi clan can understand our strategic intentions. This can not only preserve our strength, but also achieve the purpose of confusing Taisha. At that time, it will depend on which of the two parties offers a higher price. ”
The three elders said in unison: "Old Ancestor Saint."
After that, they came to the huge sand table in the castle hall and conducted a military chess game. They felt that this matter could be solved.
Mu Sheng walked around the sand table a few times, pondered for a moment and then ordered: "Zongbi, you are the general. I will give you fifty thousand troops. You will be responsible for the full command of this military operation. Jacques will be the deputy general to assist your uncle." Fight."
Borzongbi and Borjak stepped forward to receive the order: "I will obey the decree of our ancestors."
Mu Sheng turned to Bortas and told him: "Tasi, you are a relatively stable person. If you find someone to arrange this conflict, you must expand the influence of the incident so that I can have a chance to force the Xi tribe to send troops. "
Bortas cupped his hands and said: "I will obey the decree of our ancestors."
After the imperial meeting dispersed, Mu Sheng's consciousness had drifted to the core of Que Gubao and extracted Borges' memory crystal, which was valuable information on the southern Xinjiang strategy. He also read and studied the half-old emperor's memory about Taisha. , only to realize one thing, that is, the former Prime Minister Taisha can still get away with it without any punishment after his defeat... Taisha's current political logic is that as long as the current ruling elite loses power, or the political struggle fails, he only needs to admit defeat verbally. If you return to your fiefdom and become a tenant, you will no longer be held accountable. If you still try to make a comeback and rebel against the current people in power, you may end up fighting.
The current way of doing things in Taisha is quite similar to the ancient customs of the Central Plains. These Taisha nobles are similar to the various local princes in the Dayu Dynasty. Since the Taisha dignitaries have local fiefs and armies, generally speaking, among the Taisha nobles, We don’t dare to go too far in political struggles. There are political marriages between nobles. We are all relatives. It would not be good for everyone to completely break up. It might just be a fight between Taisha nobles. Big brawl.
The strength of the nobles will be reduced sharply as they fight again and again. If not, the Taisha royal family will be advantaged in vain. The Taisha imperial power will further expand its influence, and the life of the nobles will be even more difficult.
The difference between Taisha and the Central Plains is that most of the Taisha nobles hold official positions in the royal capital based on their titles. Many of them have lived in the royal capital for generations and occasionally return to their own fiefdoms to take a look. The relationships between the Taisha nobles are intricately intertwined.
To a certain extent, Taisha implemented an indirect feudal system. It was not like the Central Plains during the Dayu Dynasty. The princes from all over the country spent most of their time in the fiefdom. They only came to the capital once when they came to see their son. Over time, the local and local relations The centrifugal force in the central government will become stronger and stronger, and later it will gradually evolve into the Warring States Period.
In fact, the centripetal force of the princes from various parts of Taisha towards the country is stronger than that of the princes from various parts of the Yu Dynasty. This is actually related to the different historical processes of development between the two countries.
Most of the Taisha nobles were canonized by the previous kings of Taisha. Some nobles were directly canonized as nobles by the king who surrendered after Taisha destroyed the country. The relationship between them is more like the head office after conquering the country. Shares were given to internal veterans, and everyone is a shareholder. Emperor Taisha is the largest shareholder, and is owned by various medium-sized shareholders. The subsidiaries are controlled by these medium-sized shareholders. The overall structure of the company is fairly stable.
But the Dayu Dynasty in the Central Plains was different. The Dayu Dynasty was more like the Zhou Dynasty of Mu Sheng's era. It issued a set of bronze ritual vessels to the military nobles who were attached to it and pointed you in a direction, and you relied on the people under your command. The tribes should go to that barbaric land to develop their own foundation. Except for the princes with the same surname, the head office of the Yu Dynasty actually provided very limited support to princes with other surnames.
As a result, the subsidiaries under the head office of the Yu Dynasty were very powerful, and the spokespersons of the subsidiaries often defied the headquarters. Later, the Yu Dynasty gradually declined under the attack of the northern barbarians, and the princes everywhere saw that their elder brother could not control them. On the scene, they started fighting with each other even more unscrupulously, completely ignoring their eldest brother.
The reason is very simple. Most of these princes under the Yu Dynasty started their own businesses and were successfully listed on the New Third Board. Their stock prices are higher than the outdated head office of the Dayu Dynasty. Why should people listen to the nominal head office's comments?
However, most of the feudal lords and fiefs in Taisha are gifted by the king, which is different in nature. It is the boss who takes the initiative to allocate houses and money. The various states under Taisha are not subsidiaries that have successfully started their own business, but are distributed by the boss. The princes' right to speak and their own authority will be relatively weak.
Although in the history of Taisha, nobles often rebelled, and there are precedents in history where the lower-level princes killed the major shareholder, Emperor Taisha, and replaced him. The main reason was that the emperor Taisha who was in power at that time was basically a master who brought disaster to the country and the people. During his reign, he offended After killing too many people and losing the support of the people, the local princes had a moral advantage in revolting, so that they could successfully kill Emperor Taisha and replace him.
Under normal circumstances, as long as Emperor Taisha on the stage is a sane master and wants to stage a coup in Taisha, the risk is quite high, because not all nobles have the same interests as the rebels.
Mu Sheng wants to determine the strategy of going south and gradually encroach on the behemoth Taisha. It is impossible without in-depth research. As long as Taisha can be captured, it will not be difficult to dominate southern Xinjiang and become the Southern Emperor in the future. This will not be achieved overnight. Maybe it will not happen overnight. It would take at least decades or hundreds of years to completely defeat Taisha. Although Taisha was a powerful nation, the size of the country was more than ten times that of Shanpu, so he had to deal with it carefully.
