"Brother Lu, let's go first. I will come to see you again when I have time."
At this time, Shangguan Haiyue reluctantly let go of Lu Yuan's hand and said with a little reluctance.
In fact, when his brother and sister left this time, it was apparently due to his father's plan and they had to serve in the army.
But in fact, both his brother and sister are only second-rate in strength. How useful can they be in a battle with hundreds of thousands of troops?
The reason why he said goodbye this time was actually due to Yang Jing's persuasion afterwards.
For Yang Jing and the imperial court, the most important thing at the moment is to gather the ten great masters, and then suppress the rebellion internally and defend the enemy externally.
In order to achieve this goal, it is undoubtedly very important for Lu Yuan to break through Xiantian as quickly as possible.
Therefore, after knowing that Lu Yuan was about to break through the innate world, in order to prevent him from being affected by the Shangguan brothers and sisters, especially their children's affair, Yang Jing, in the name of Uncle Shi, forced the Shangguan brothers and sisters not to disturb Lu Yuan during this period.
This is also the reason why Lu Yuan did not see Shangguan brother and sister coming to make things happen during the entire conference.
Then Yang Jing sent a letter to Shangguan Ming. Chen Ming was very good, so there was a scene where the two sides parted in front of the army today.
"After the rebels are calmed down, Guangbai, Haiyue, and we can get together as we please." Lu Yuan nodded with a smile.
In fact, he could probably guess a little bit about the reason why Shangguan brother and sister left, but he didn't try to persuade them to stay.
Just as Yang Jing had considered, although Lu Yuan now intends to marry those aristocratic families, his top priority is to break through the innateness first.
Therefore, at this time, any factors that would affect his breakthrough must be compromised.
At this time, that's it.
After saying goodbye to each other, the Shangguan brothers and sisters quickly hit the road and headed west.
They rushed to Baling City, which was much closer than Lu Yuan's return trip to Luyang.
To the west, you only need to pass through Yuzhang Mansion to reach Yueyang Mansion, where the imperial army is located. It is only four to five hundred miles on both sides, so it is very close.
Lu Yuan needs to go south along the waterway, passing Yuzhang Prefecture, Yichun Prefecture, Luling Prefecture, and then turn southwest to reach Luyang County. The journey is more than a thousand miles by water and land, which is more than the Shangguan brothers and sisters. Thousands of miles.
On the way back, it was no longer as pleasant as when we came.
Lu Yuan was worried about the war situation in Dongting County, fearing that his basic situation would cause some trouble. Qi Yun was also worried about the safety of his apprentice during the war.
So the two of them worked hard, covered with stars and wearing moonlight, and traveled day and night. It took them more than ten days to finally get back to Luyang Mansion.
During this period, when Qi Yun was in Luling Mansion, he separated from Lu Yuan because they were on different roads, and returned to Hengyang Mansion on his own, without going together.
However, with the abilities of the two of them, in this troubled world, even if they can protect themselves alone, there is no danger.
That's not a big deal.
…
After two months, Lu Yuan returned to Luyang Fucheng again. He was surprised to find that the scenery here was completely different from before he left.
There are many construction sites outside the city. The government is organizing farmers who have neglected their farming work this year to work for relief and start building water conservancy and leveling roads.
A large number of men sweated at various construction sites, completely calming down the people who might have become unstable factors due to the disaster.
…
Green seedlings are also growing in the fields beside the road. The second round of autumn rice after sowing is now growing vigorously.
Entering the city, the streets were no longer as deserted as before, but became crowded with many business travelers.
Judging from the accents of these people, they are not all Luyang locals, but there are a lot of foreign dialects. Lu Yuan was quite familiar with some of them, coming from half of his hometown, Luling Prefecture.
Looking at this scene, Lu Yuan couldn't help but feel gratified.
The fact that Luyang Mansion can recover so quickly is undoubtedly an enhancement to his strength.
It was indeed a very correct decision to hand over Luyang Mansion to Sun Siwen.
This point was further confirmed by Lu Yuan after returning to the government office and meeting with Sun Siwen.
"In the past two months, with the reconstruction and improvement of local government offices, local production has also resumed. The autumn rice has been planted and will be harvested in one or two months.
At the same time, with the money allocated by Brother Lu, I also started to develop water conservancy projects and build roads in the local area, and brought in many people who could not survive in the area.
This series of projects cost a total of 150,000 taels of silver.
At the same time, this year, the summer rice in Yuzhang County is ripe, it is a rich season, and the price of grain is much cheaper than in previous years.
Therefore, I sent a letter to all the prefectures in Yuzhang County and sent people there to purchase new rice. Now, a total of 500,000 shi of grain has been received one after another, which is enough to feed the 100,000 people in the prefecture for a year.
Even supplying a large army would be enough to feed 20,000 people for four years.
But buying so much rice cost a lot of money. Nowadays, there are wars everywhere. Even if the summer rice is ripe in Yuzhang County, the price of rice is still six cents per catty.
Five hundred thousand shi of grain was purchased. According to the current price of silver, a total of three hundred thousand taels of silver was spent.
Also, before Brother Lu left, he gave instructions to gather as many refugees as possible to enrich the local population.
In the past few months, the Yueyang Prefecture in the north had been experiencing successive battles, and even the Changsha Prefecture was deeply affected.
There was turmoil in these two prefectures, and many people were displaced and fled to all directions.
Although most of the refugees from the two prefectures fled to Yuzhang County, many also fled south.
I sent people to collect some of them, and in total we got 10,000 households with more than 40,000 people. Now they have been placed in various places in Luyang Prefecture. This item also cost 50,000 taels of silver.
Taking this opportunity, I ordered the local government offices to conduct a census of household registrations in each county. According to the statistics, there are more than 34,000 households and more than 145,000 people in the ten counties of the prefecture. Counting the 10,000 newly acquired refugee households, the whole government has 45,000 households with a population of 190,000.
However, both local people and refugees need government assistance. Most of the 500,000 shi of grain purchased this year must be invested, leaving at most 100,000 shi of grain and grass to supply military supplies.
In the past few months, the soldiers of various prefectures and counties, as well as the officials of prefectures and yamen, have also spent 200,000 taels in salary.
Adding up these items, the whole government spent a total of 700,000 taels of silver in the past six months.
Because of the purchase of food and the care of the refugees, the expenses were much higher than originally expected. The 800,000 taels of silver that Brother Lu had previously appropriated, now only have 100,000 taels left, which can only last for two months at most.
Therefore, if we want to ensure the current development trend, it is inevitable to increase investment in silver.
This requires Brother Lu to make further allocations.
…
However, now the refugees have almost been gathered together, food purchasing has ended, and local production has slowly resumed. Such large expenditures will no longer occur in the future.
In the future, the government's expenditure should remain at 50,000 taels per month and there will be no increase. "
In the study room of the government office, Sun Siwen took out a thick account book and reported to Lu Yuan his work in the six months since he took office.
Lu Yuan listened, flipped through the account books, and nodded from time to time.
It has to be said that Sun Siwen's achievements in the first six months since he took office as prefect are outstanding, although this outstanding performance is based on the premise of a large amount of silver investment.
But whether you have money is one thing; whether you can make good use of it is another.
Even if you give some people hundreds of millions of money, they will not be able to accomplish anything big. They will only squander it and accomplish nothing.
Being able to use money well and put it to practical use is also a skill.
Sun Siwen has this ability.
Lu Yuan was also very satisfied with his friend's ability. He nodded and said, "Don't worry about money. I will allocate another one million taels to you later. You can use the money to buy more." Some food.”
Sun Siwen was a little confused when he heard this: "Now there is enough food and grass in the county to appease the refugees and supply military supplies. There is no need to spend any more money to buy food."
Sun Siwen is a civil servant. From his perspective, all industries in Luyang Prefecture are now recovering. After this year is over, everything can resume production next year.
At that time, let alone food and grass, there is no need to ask Lu Yuan for financial investment. The government itself can provide finance and taxes to support Lu Yuan.
Therefore, buying grain at high prices at this time is an uneconomical business no matter how you look at it.
Lu Yuan could understand his friend's thoughts, but as a military commander, he was also the master of power, and he also had the ambition to practice Taiping Taoism, so he couldn't consider it this way.
At this time, he explained: "Nowadays, there are constant wars in the county, and even Zhou soldiers have crossed the river south to confront the imperial Miao army at the foot of Baling City. There are constant battles day and night.
There is also a continuous war in Shaoyang Mansion. Although Lan Zhaoyun of the Five Poison Sect has led an army of 50,000 to Baling City, there are still 60,000 Miao soldiers left in Shaoyang Mansion, and they are still fighting with Shaoyang Mansion.
Even in our Yangshan Mansion south of Luyang, the Miao people gathered 30,000 troops to spy on our mansion at all times.
Nowadays, the Miao people have stationed heavy troops in three battlefields in the county, with 170,000 troops. In addition to the Zhou troops crossing the river, the number of thieves in the county has reached 230,000.
As for the imperial troops in the county, our department has 30,000 soldiers and 40,000 prefecture and county militia. In the two prefectures of Hengyang and Changsha in the north, there are 20,000 prefecture and county militia groups. The imperial court recruited 100,000 Miao troops.
The total of these three groups is only 190,000, including 60,000 prefectural and county militia groups that cannot go abroad to fight.
There are only 130,000 soldiers and horses that can really go out to fight, which is a full 100,000 less than the bandits.
There are nearly twice as many thieves as me, and it is extremely difficult to defeat them.
Moreover, the people of Zhou intend to destroy me. Now they can send 50,000 people across the river to the south. Who knows if they will send another 50,000 people or even 100,000 people across the river in the future?
Therefore, in my judgment, it will take three to five years to quell the rebellion in Dongting County and repel the Zhou people. "
Lu Yuan analyzed his views on the situation in the county.
…
Judging from the apparent strength, the Zhou and Miao coalition forces were nearly twice as powerful as the imperial court. With the imperial court's current strength in Dongting County, it is almost impossible to defeat this enemy force.
Therefore, unless the imperial court continues to invest troops, or some sudden change occurs, resulting in a huge disparity in strength between the two sides, the winner will be determined quickly.
Otherwise, this battle can only be a long-term war of attrition, and it depends on who can no longer hold on first.
And with the current strength of the Yue Kingdom, if they could muster an army of 100,000 to conquer the Miao people, the six surnames and seven clans would already be selling the pot.
After all, the imperial court had been fighting the Liang people for three years, using five to six million troops. Later, they supported hundreds of thousands of Pingnan troops and fought with Jinghai Kingdom for nearly three years. Previously, there was another army of tens of thousands of people fighting against Shu, which also supported it for more than a year.
The scale of these four military deployments reached one million, and one can imagine how huge the expenditure on money and food was.
Among this million-strong army, the number of casualties in countless battles exceeded 400,000.
In four years, so many elites were lost. No matter how strong the foundations of the six surnames and seven clans are, and no matter how wealthy the court is, they cannot afford to do this.
Therefore, the 100,000 imperial soldiers and horses commanded by Shangguan Ming were already the last army that the imperial court could muster after selling iron.
It will be impossible to form a new army in the next three to five years, or even ten years.
On the one hand, there is no silver, and on the other hand, there are no more qualified sources of soldiers.
The nine counties of the imperial court, the seven counties of Jian'an, Nanhai, Yulin, Jiuzhen, Dongting, Xichuan, and Guangling, were either trapped by thieves, suffered from wars, or were newly attached. They all suffered heavy losses in population, destroyed local production, and were unable to provide soldiers and goods. The place.
Therefore, the only ones that can still provide money, food and troops to the court are its core territories, Linhai County and Yuzhang County.
It was these two counties that successively provided the imperial court with 700,000 to 800,000 soldiers and horses, as well as countless money and food for these soldiers and horses, helping the imperial court maintain its current situation.
And with so much blood shed, no matter how wealthy these two counties are, it will be difficult to provide more troops, money and food.
After the local government calmed down and a new generation grew up, the imperial court was unable to form more armies.
It was precisely because of this that conventional forces were unable to reverse the situation, so those six surnames and seven tribes began to think of the ten great masters.
He planned to use high-end combat power to crush the enemy and reverse the situation.
For this reason, he did not hesitate to cut off the land of two counties, just to win over the innate masters in the world.
And if the imperial court wants to negotiate with the masters in the world and win them into its own camp, it will take less than two or three years, which is simply impossible.
After all, they are all Jianghu people, and they are from the Xiantian Sect, so they have their own foundation.
Even if the imperial court does not give them half a county, they will still have the influence and interests they should have in the local area. Some powerful Xiantian sects have even less influence on the local area than the Five Poison Sect in Dongting County.
Do you still dare to touch other people’s cakes?
Aren't you afraid that these Jianghu sects will immediately raise troops and stage another Five Poison Rebellion?
Therefore, people themselves have enough dignity, and they really do not necessarily value the dignity given by the court.
…
It's only half a county, and not necessarily anyone would like it.
That is to say, the Xiantian Sect like Baifeng Temple, which is located in Linhai County, the core of the six surnames and seven clans, is always squeezed by these aristocratic families and can't breathe. Only then did he hear the court's conditions for moving it to a nest, and he hurriedly got together.
Such conditions would not be so easy to negotiate with other Xiantian sects.
Otherwise, it would have been a year since the imperial court spread rumors that it wanted to win over the Xiantian Sect.
In one year, except for Baifeng Temple, why has there been no movement from other Xiantian sects?
This is why it’s hard for others to fool you.
It was also Yang Jing who, after seeing Lu Yuan's potential to break through his innate abilities, hurriedly approached him and took the initiative to get him to join the Ten Grandmasters program.
It's not because other Jianghu masters have families and businesses and look down on the imperial court. Therefore, I have no choice but to choose Lu Yuan, a stock with great potential that has just started his business and has not yet achieved success.
Everything is reality.
Lu Yuan slowly figured out all of the above on his way back.
And in response to this, some of his original strategies for dealing with the court have also changed.
Now that the imperial court is more demanding of itself, and now that it has seen clearly the true and falsehoods of the other party, its deterrence has naturally been greatly reduced.
So naturally some of the conditions originally promised when Yang Jing was frightened had to be changed.
For example, the place where the country is feudal can be changed from Jiuzhen County to Dongting County. As for the territory of the feudal state, could it be possible to add one or two more prefectures from the original five prefectures, or even directly occupy a county?
After obtaining the Taoist Book of Taiping, Lu Yuan felt that he could ask for more, whether it was for his own cultivation or for his own strength after cultivating as an immortal.
Hence this remark.
Of course, Sun Siwen didn't know what Lu Yuan was thinking. He also didn't know that his friend had already reached cooperation with the imperial court and had the idea of enfeoffing the country.
However, after listening to Lu Yuan's analysis, his sight gradually shifted from the original focus on one house to the entire county and even the country, and he naturally discovered the crisis.
Therefore, after thinking deeply, Sun Siwen nodded and said: "If you want to quell the rebellion and repel the enemy, it is indeed not a short-term effort, but a long-term effort."
Lu Yuanshen took it seriously and said: "If you want to defeat the thieves, it will take countless years to achieve it. For such a long time, the agricultural production in the county will be affected, and the food shortage will not be far away.
If there is no food and grass to help the people by then, even if the place is peaceful, there will definitely be chaos again.
In addition, in order to deal with the traitors and assist the court in countering the rebellion, I intend to expand the army by another 20,000 and form 50,000 combat troops to cope with changes in the situation. This also requires food and grass support.
Therefore, if you can buy food from outside the county, buy it without hesitation.
If you don’t have enough money, you can come to me to get it at any time.
I still have three million taels of silver in my hand. Even if I give you one million taels, there will still be two million taels left. No matter how much we squander it, it will be enough for a year.
After a year, I will find my own way to earn new money. "
Now that we have switched to another way of thinking, the original conservative strategy will naturally no longer work.
Even though he has the foundation of Immortal Fate Jade Piece, after he breaks through the innateness, he will be able to cultivate immortality at worst.
But how much fairy spirit is contained in the jade pieces is still unknown.
For the sake of conservatism, we still cannot let go of reaching the conditions of a million people, offering sacrifices to the Tianzhu, and attracting the spiritual energy of heaven and earth.
Therefore, Lu Yuan has decided to expand his army by fifty thousand, and then lead his troops to attack the three prefectures of Yangshan, Jiuyi, and Lingling in the south of Dongting County, which are occupied by the Miao people.
Although these three prefectures are mostly in mountainous areas and are very poor, they still have a combined population of 700,000 to 800,000 people. Even excluding the Miao people, there are still 300,000 to 400,000 local Yue people.
If this place can be conquered, including Luyang and Shaoyang, we can almost have a population of one million, meeting the minimum conditions for worshiping the Tianzhu.
Through external expansion, Lu Yuan could also expand his territory, obtain more money and food, and raise more soldiers.
The land of the two prefectures cannot support an army of fifty thousand. But if it were the land of the Five Prefectures, it might not be impossible.
Therefore, external expansion has become Lu Yuan's established strategy that cannot be changed after obtaining the Book of Taiping.
Sun Siwen saw that his friends had expressed their opinions and that buying food was indeed not a bad thing. He nodded and said, "Okay. There is still a lot of food in Yuzhang County. I can find a way to buy more. There is more." I dare not say, but two to three hundred thousand dan is still guaranteed.”
Lu Yuan smiled: "Then I'll leave it to Brother Sun."
At this point, Lu Yuan's camp's strategy for the next few years has been decided.
