The sky is blue, the wild awns are shining, and the wind-swept grass is showing horses. This is Kaifeng!
It is the crisp autumn season in Kaifeng Mansion Prairie. The sky is blue and cloudless. On the golden grassland, you can see large groups of horses everywhere, driven by herdsmen, eating and walking on the grassland.
No matter how you look at this scene, it looks like you are on the prairie outside the mouth. If Bianliangzi before the tragedy of Xuanhe and the officials of the Song Dynasty knew that at this moment, their favorite Kaifeng Mansion, outside the Song Dynasty Tokyo with the highest housing prices in the world, would actually look like this He looked like he was really going to die.
In the original history, the Kaifeng Mansion under the iron heel of the Golden Heavenly Soldiers was not as "miserable" as it is now. After all, when Wan Yanliang ruled the Jin Kingdom, Kaifeng Mansion became the Nanjing Road of Jin Dynasty. Later, due to the rise of Mongolia, the Jurchens had to move their ruling center to Henan, and Kaifeng Mansion once again Become the leader of a country.
But the Mongols who came later were not so polite. They slashed Kaifeng Mansion into a wilderness with their butcher knives. It was probably almost the same as it is now!
At that time, the entire Central Plains was full of wilderness, but now only Kaifeng Mansion was unlucky, and was chosen by Zhao Kai to become a horse farm. Therefore, after the water of the Yellow River receded, it became a grassland, and the once glorious and magnificent city of Kaifeng in the center of this prairie has now become a huge spare stable - if the Jin Bing cavalry suddenly kills near the Kaifeng prairie , then the horses that roam on the prairie will gather in Kaifeng Fucheng.
However, Zhao Kai's arrangement back then was obviously overly worrying. Because from the second year of Hongwu when the Kaifeng Mansion Racecourse was officially established to the autumn of the sixth year of Hongwu, for more than five years, the Golden Thief Cavalry has never been to Kaifeng Mansion again.
Although the gold thief's cavalry did not come, the west thief's horse still came to Kaifeng Mansion... only horses, no cavalry.
After the battle to regain Lingzhou, Zhao Kai exchanged the Dangxiang people from the five states of Ling, Wei, You, Yin, and Xia for hundreds of thousands of horses (he originally wanted to exchange for 200,000 horses), and then More than 30,000 strong mares and more than a thousand tall and powerful stallions were selected and sent to the six to seven million acres of grassland around Kaifeng Mansion for free range.
Before and after their arrival, Zhao Kai tried every means to obtain a batch of Qinghai Cong from the Qing, Tang, and Tubo tribes. Among them, the high-quality ones were kept at Shangyanggong Racecourse, while the poor-quality ones were placed in Kaifeng. The racecourse serves as a stud.
After two or three years of breeding, by the fifth year of Hongwu, the Qinghai Cong population at Shangyanggong Racecourse exceeded 1,000 horses, and the horse population at Kaifeng Racecourse reached more than 80,000 horses!
From the autumn of the fifth year of Hongwu, the Kaifeng Prefecture Racecourse began to supply underage horses to the cavalry military households in the three camps in the west of Beijing, Hebei, and Hedong. Horses generally do not become fully mature until they are four years old, but when they are two years old, they are fully mature. It's ready to hold the hoof. Now the war with the golden thief is about to begin, and the consumption of horses will be very huge. Therefore, Zhao Kai no longer cares about protecting the "underage horses", and has already taken care of the stallions and females with relatively ordinary qualifications born in the Kaifeng Racecourse. Horses are sold to cavalry households at half price so that they can become horse parents early.
Of course, after those young mares successfully become pregnant with their babies, most of the young stallions that have not yet fully grown up will have to be cut off by a knife... If they can't survive and During this period of time when the mare is holding hands, they try to grow up. If they reach the standard of a stallion, they will no longer need a mare in this life.
After being cut, these young geldings will begin to receive saddle training and training...because their future belongs to the battlefield!
After the autumn of the sixth year of Hongwu, these geldings, which have been trained for several months, will be taken to their birthplace, Kaifeng Prairie, by their owners, and then undergo ten months of tactical training here, mainly training in formation charge. .
By the summer of the seventh year of Hongwu, these geldings were almost fully grown - if the war horses were castrated earlier (but not too early, otherwise there would be no way to select high-quality sires), they would have a chance to grow bigger than Those stallions that had not been stabbed were taller and stronger. After completing training and growth, they will rush to the battlefield of the Northern Expedition to Yanyun!
In September of the sixth year of Hongwu, Zhao Kai also left Luoyang, the sacred capital, and came to Kaifeng Mansion. At the same time, he established a personal expedition camp in Kaifeng Mansion with Han Shizhong as the general manager, Yue Fei as the deputy general manager, and Zhang Xian as a soldier.
According to the edict issued by Zhao Kai before leaving Luoyang, he will sit in Kaifeng Mansion and personally preside over the overall situation of the Northern Expedition. He will also assemble an army on the Kaifeng prairie for training a year in advance.
Zhao Kai's edict was issued in the summer of the sixth year of Hongwu. After receiving the edict, the Privy Council and the Ministry of War immediately jointly issued an order to mobilize soldiers.
According to the military register issued by the Privy Council and the Ministry of War to the four camps and envoys, before the end of the sixth year of Hongwu, at least 240,000 regular soldiers and utility soldiers must be gathered in Kaifeng Prefecture, and then organized into 12 camps under the command of the Camping Division. military.
At the same time, a large number of civilians were also summoned by the purchasers of Yingtian 4th Road (having to spend copper coins, silk or cloth tickets), driving horse-drawn carriages and donkey carts to transport cart after cart of military supplies from various places. Shipped to Kaifeng Mansion.
From this time on, the entire Northern Song Empire became a powerful war machine, and the entire country's war potential began to be gradually released.
...
Brother Liu, whose ancestral home is Lantian County, Chang'an Prefecture, has now become a part of this war machine. He has now received the title of sergeant, and been allocated a farm of 200 acres in Xingzhou, and he has also got his wish to marry a young lady from Lantian Lu Baiwan's family... Although he He didn't become a sergeant, but he slept with Lu Cuishan's wife, Lu Wanwan's family, and let Lu Cuishan's son catch her.
Lu Cuishan had no choice but to marry her daughter to Brother Liu, who had changed his name to Liu Wu, and also gave him a large dowry. Brother Liu Wu used the dowry to settle down in Xingzhou, bought himself a Qingtang armor (Xingling Prefecture also produced Qingtang armor, but the output was not as good as Luoyang), and bought a piece of Qingtang armor produced in Sichuan. A buffalo horn bow and a bag of Sanbuqi arrows were exchanged for a castrated mixed-breed Qinghai Cong at the age of twelve or thirteen at the horse market in Qingtang City, Xining Prefecture, at a cost of dozens of pieces of silk.
Although this horse was old and still a mixed breed, because it was cut earlier and raised more carefully, it was still a rare and good horse when it was in Liu Wu's hands.
And Liu Wu, who wanted to make great achievements, also liked this good horse very much. He almost treated the horse as the ancestor of horses and served him, raising him so fat and strong. I don’t want to ride for a while on weekdays. It was the same when he took it to Kaifeng Mansion this time. On the way, he was only willing to ride the Qinghai Cong for an hour every day, and then switch to a short Khitan horse with outstanding endurance. And every time he went to camp to rest, he would first serve his Ma Zuzong carefully, and then do other things.
The companions who were traveling with him all understood that he almost treated the horse like a father! But Liu Wu still went his own way. And under the care of his "filial son", after traveling 2,000 miles, the mixed-breed Qinghai Cong was even more impressive than when he left Xingzhou!
When he was riding his "ancestral horse", he was wearing a shiny green Tang armor, carrying a strung buffalo horn bow, a bag of Sanbuqi arrows, and a slender When I followed the large group of Xingzhou soldiers into the Nanxun Gate of Kaifeng Fucheng with my head high and chest high, I felt so proud in my heart!
In his current appearance, before the war was declared, he would have been a Western Army general from a noble family! The dowry his wife brought was really not in vain!
With just this horse, this armor, this bow and arrow... and the martial arts skills he has developed over the past two years, he can kill a few gold thieves on the battlefield, right?
The reputation of a sergeant must be earned!
When he was feeling proud, a cheering voice suddenly sounded in his ears: "Long live my emperor! Long live! Long live..."
Liu Wu hurriedly looked up and saw six black banners and two white flags symbolizing the emperor suddenly appearing on the tower of Nanxun Gate!
This shows that the Luoyang officials are now on the South Xunmen Gate Tower, watching everyone enter the city!
Thinking of this, Liu Wu's chest immediately puffed up, and he raised his arms and shouted with everyone: "Long live my emperor, long live my emperor..."
"Very good, very energetic!"
Zhao Kai who was on the city gate floor also saw Liu Wu and specially praised him. But he didn't pay too much attention...because during this period, he saw a lot of particularly spirited soldiers every day.
These government soldiers are a bit like military contractors (feudalism is actually contracting). As long as they can obtain sufficient profits through war, there is no problem of not being willing to invest - this is a virtuous circle!
Moreover, they spent their own money to buy horses and equipment. Even the equipment and horses given to them by Zhao Kai were all owned by them after the war, so they were well maintained and they had high requirements for quality. .
In addition, there are many powerful folk who are keen on the division of land and promotion among the government soldiers. They will pay for their own equipment and come to serve as Zhao Kai's servants in order to get a chance to rise (although they are recruiting soldiers, they are also part of the government army system).
Therefore, in this case, the cost of the government army system is not high, but the efficiency is excellent and the combat effectiveness is guaranteed. This is when it is most powerful.
The victorious battles in the early years of the Tang Dynasty and the devastation in the early Ming Dynasty were all caused by such soldiers (military households). Although these two armies later declined due to various reasons, in the early days, they were the most powerful war machines in the world.
It took Zhao Kai seven years to finally build his own powerful Fubing legion!
