The drums thundered and the shouts shook the sky.
In the military camp outside Baling City, soldiers and horses roared and flags were like clouds. Groups of soldiers obeyed the orders and constantly changed their formations under the command of their superiors.
"Yes, these soldiers and horses have only been in camp for less than a month, and they are so impressive. Li Liang, your ability in training troops is worthy of being the leader of our Chu Kingdom."
On the general ordering platform, Lu Yuan looked at the army practicing below, couldn't help but turn around, and said to the disciples beside him with great satisfaction.
Among his many true disciples, Li Liang's martial arts talent was actually not that outstanding, and even belonged to the middle to lower level.
But the other party was able to stand out and become a disciple alongside Chu Wei and second only to Zhou Qing. Naturally, he had something to rely on.
Although Li Liang is not good at practicing martial arts, when it comes to training ability, all disciples should put him first.
Lu Yuan valued this point when he promoted the other party.
In fact, over the years, the Chu army was able to conquer the north and south, and was invincible without any defeat.
In addition to the reason why Lu Yuan was a commander who was good at leading troops, Li Liang also contributed to the continuous training of soldiers and horses in the rear, cultivating qualified armies for the Chu State.
On this point alone, the other party's contribution is no less than that of Chu Wei who single-handedly created the naval army for Chu State.
"The disciples are not good at martial arts, and their command of troops is even more mediocre. They can only master the art of military training, and they can barely master it."
Hearing the praise from his master and king, Li Liang smiled humbly, then looked at the army below and said: "Now, after a month of training, the army has begun to build up its strength and has learned some military law formations.
But this is just the beginning.
Later, more meat will be provided, along with military fist and kick skills, so that these new recruits can practice martial arts and become familiar with the sword and spear techniques commonly used in the military.
During this period, they were taught how to use drums and flags, and taught them military laws and regulations, so that they would know awe and respect for superiors and subordinates.
After three years of hard training and training, once you go into battle and see blood, and experience life and death, you will become a powerful army in the world. "
After more than ten years of military training experience, as well as learning from military training methods from all over the world, Chu State has now figured out a perfect military training method, summarized it into a system, and completely standardized it.
The method of military training mentioned by Li Liang is the general outline.
Over the years, all new soldiers recruited by the Chu State were trained according to this method.
The final result is quite good.
In the past two years, Lu Yuan led his army to conquer the barbarians in the southwest, and finally defeated them all, which shows the ability of this method of training troops.
Li Liang was confident that the elite troops he had trained were no less powerful than the powerful armies of other countries, and could compete with the powerful countries in the world.
"You are in charge of training these new soldiers, so don't worry about being alone."
Lu Yuan heard Li Liang's words and nodded with a smile: "I have been practicing in Chu for several years, and I have enough time to train new soldiers. But in addition to the 80,000 troops newly organized and trained this time, you also have the soldiers and horses recruited last year. Take more control.
Nowadays, all countries are in chaos. Our country of Chu rarely has time to breathe. We must seize the time and increase our strength as much as possible.
I'm not worried about the old soldiers in the army.
But the hundreds of thousands of soldiers and horses recruited last year and this year are indeed too immature to be of great use.
A few years later, you will be fighting alone in the world, and you will need the support of a strong army. It depends on you. "
Lu Yuan looked at Li Liang with burning eyes.
The latter received this earnest request and solemnly accepted the order: "Don't worry, Your Majesty, in a few years, I will deliver a strong army into the hands of Your Majesty, and I will definitely live up to my trust."
"Um."
Lu Yuan nodded with satisfaction, and then said comfortingly: "As long as you handle this matter well, I will not begrudge you the honors and titles."
Today, all countries in the world are undergoing turbulent changes.
Especially with the rapid rise of the Liang Kingdom in the north, the battles between countries have intensified, making them more intense and cruel.
At this time, the scale of soldiers and horses used in a war between various countries has generally increased to hundreds of thousands or millions, which is an unknown amount of expansion compared to before.
Lu Yuanke still remembered that when the Liang Kingdom went south, the Yue Kingdom only sent 300,000 troops north to attack them across the river.
Later in the Northern Expedition to the Zhou Kingdom, the troops directly under the Yue Kingdom were only more than 100,000. Counting Changsha Kingdom, Nanhai Kingdom and other vassals, the number did not exceed 500,000, and there were also a large number of civilian soldiers and horses among them.
In terms of actual combat troops, the four countries combined did not exceed 200,000.
There can be two wars, and it is already a big country like Yue that has unified Yangzhou, and it has tried its best to maintain the army.
But now, only more than ten years have passed, and among the countries in the world, the scale of one, two, two, or three hundred thousand soldiers and horses at the beginning can no longer be called a national war. At most, it can only be regarded as a local battle.
On the battlefield on the western front of the Zhou Kingdom, 400,000 soldiers and 600,000 civilians and warriors were mobilized, with a strength of over one million.
On the Eastern Front, 400,000 soldiers were also mobilized. There were also about 200,000 struggling civilians and warriors, with a total strength of 600,000.
On the northern front, in order to defend against the Wei State, there were 100,000 soldiers stationed there for a long time, as well as about 300,000 civilians and warriors, and 400,000 soldiers and horses.
Even in Hanzhong County on the southern front, there are 50,000 soldiers and 100,000 local warriors, with a total strength of 150,000.
In addition to the 50,000 soldiers in the capital of Zhou Dynasty and the soldiers and horses left behind in various counties and counties, these internal security forces have about 200,000 soldiers and horses.
There is only one Zhou State, and the number of troops that can be used in the whole country now is more than 2.35 million.
I don't know if it is it.
The Ning State in Yangzhou had already organized an army of 600,000. After hearing about the Liang State incident a few days ago, the Jianwu Emperor in Jinling was even more stimulated. He also expanded the domestic army by 200,000, increasing the national military strength to 800,000.
The Xu State in Xuzhou has stationed 600,000 soldiers in the southern border of the Xu State in order to prevent the Liang State from moving north.
The Zhao State in Jizhou has always relied on force to establish its country, and its military strength is even more powerful. Before the Liang State unified Qingzhou, the Zhao State heard that there were millions of troops in the country.
Now that Liang Guo has unified a state, it has threatened Zhao Guo's safety. Being stimulated by this, he wonders how far Zhao Guo's troops have expanded now?
Thinking about 1.2 million, there should be some.
As for the Liang Kingdom, after unifying Qingzhou, it had fifteen counties and a population of more than 70 million.
With such a vast territory and such a prosperous population, the army that can be supported is naturally incalculable.
According to reports from the Foreign Affairs Bureau of Qingzhou Imperial City, after unifying Qingzhou, Liang State began to expand its army. Moreover, the scale of the army expansion was to recruit one million new troops in one go.
This is one million new troops!
This amount makes people feel desperate just thinking about it.
Among all the countries in the world, he is probably the only one who can recruit a million soldiers at once.
The Liang Kingdom originally had one million soldiers, and counting the newly recruited troops, the Qingzhou overlord only had more than two million soldiers.
If some civilians and warriors are recruited, the scale and number of soldiers and horses will be even more unimaginable.
Based on a conservative estimate, it should be easy to mobilize 5 million troops for the whole country.
Each of the above-mentioned countries is just a fighting force, and there are often 800,000 or millions of soldiers.
If the auxiliary troops such as Minfu Xiangyong and others are included, the number of soldiers and horses would be in the millions.
Lu Yuan aspired to dominate the world and had long regarded these Nine Provinces countries as his opponents. At this time, seeing that each of them began to expand their troops and strengthen their strength, he naturally felt nervous.
Moreover, the current changing situation and the ever-expanding scale of the war have forced the Chu State to follow the general trend and expand its troops.
Therefore, after the army expansion last year, Lu Yuan changed his conservative defense strategy and chose to add four more 80,000 soldiers to the original eleven forbidden armies to enhance Chu's military strength.
In this way, there are a total of fifteen forbidden armies, and Chu State has 300,000 soldiers who can be mobilized at any time.
In addition, there are 30,000 local county soldiers, 68,000 county soldiers, and the Jinwu Guards in the capital, which have been expanded to 5,000 and are responsible for the security and defense of the capital. There are also five thousand palace guards newly established to guard the forbidden areas of the palace.
Finally, 50,000 navy troops were added.
After a series of military expansions, these various soldiers and horses were added up, and Chu State already had a total of 458,000 soldiers and horses by land and water.
All of the above are standing armies.
In addition, there are more than 100,000 Yi captives in Qianzhong County, who can barely be regarded as servants.
With all the troops and horses added up, Lu Yuan could claim to have 600,000 troops to the outside world.
And this is also the limit of Chu State.
This time the army was expanded to 86,000 people, all of whom were soldiers. In order to support them, the Chu State's annual expenditures had to increase by 6 million taels of silver.
If it weren't for the opening of gold, silver and copper mines in Qianzhong County, three vassal states such as Southwest Kunhai would have also paid taxes and contributions under the imperial edict. At the same time, Su State also started a grain trade, which gave Chu State another source of income.
Otherwise, with the financial resources of the Chu State, it really would not be able to withstand this expenditure.
However, although there were many soldiers and horses, the ones Lu Yuan could use were actually not many.
Although in the southwest, due to the acquisition of three vassal states, the security environment around Qianzhong and Xichuan counties has been greatly eased, and the number of troops stationed in the local areas can be reduced a lot.
But even so, one forbidden army must be left to guard Qianzhong County, and two forbidden troops must be left to guard Xichuan County. This can barely guarantee safety.
On the Xiangyang County side, there is Hanzhong County to the west, Xiangyang and Nanyang counties of Zhou State to the north, and Xiangyang County of Ning State to the south. It can be said that it is surrounded by enemies on three sides.
Each of these three directions needs soldiers and horses to guard it, which requires three forbidden troops.
Dongting County, where the capital is located, is an important area and requires a large number of troops to stay behind.
Moreover, to the south of Dongting County are Su State and Nanhai State. The relationship between these two countries and Chu State is not good at all, and they may suddenly send troops to attack Chu State at any time.
To the east of Dongting County is Ningguo.
Not to mention the relationship between Chu State and Ning State, they have always been enemies and competed with each other for the position of overlord of Yangzhou.
As long as there is a chance, Ning Guo will definitely choose to attack Chu State.
Now Ningguo has trained 800,000 soldiers. In addition to sending 300,000 soldiers to Guangling County to defend Jiangbei.
The remaining 500,000 people are all stationed in Jinling, ready to go up the Shuo River at any time and eyeing the Chu Kingdom.
Facing this powerful enemy, Lu Yuan naturally had to be more prepared.
Therefore, in Dongting County, there is pressure from both the south and the east. He must leave at least five forbidden troops, which is one hundred thousand soldiers.
Coupled with the local prefectural and county soldiers, the Jinwu guards and palace guards in Baling City, the 50,000 navy in Dongting Lake, the recruited militia and township warriors, and other forces, they were barely able to withstand attacks from all sides.
Calculated in this way, after arranging the guards and horses from various places, the mobile force Lu Yuan could mobilize was actually only four forbidden armies and 80,000 soldiers.
certainly.
When Lu Yuan really sends troops in a certain direction, in addition to the mobile troops and horses that can be mobilized, the local troops and horses in that direction and the guarding imperial troops will naturally be within the mobilizable force.
For example, if Lu Yuan is in Xichuan County and plans to mobilize troops to attack Hanzhong County, then Xichuan County's 40,000 imperial troops and 30,000 county soldiers can naturally be mobilized with him to attack Hanzhong County together.
Even Xiangyang County can dedicate one or two troops to guard the Forbidden City and help send troops from the flanks.
Calculating this, the number of soldiers and horses he can use is no less than 200,000.
And if Dongting County is preparing to attack Ning Kingdom, or Nanhai Kingdom, or Su Kingdom, then the 180,000 soldiers and horses left behind in Dongting County, and even the soldiers and horses in Xiangyang County, can be mobilized accordingly.
Using troops here, Lu Yuan can mobilize more than 300,000 standing soldiers.
In addition, apart from those who arranged for mining, there are still 110,000 to 20,000 Yi prisoners of war in Qianzhong County.
These captured soldiers can also be mobilized at any time and used as cannon fodder for the army.
This method has been used since Lu Yuan raised his army, and it can be said to be an old skill.
Therefore, after careful calculation, if Lu Yuan really wants to use troops in the future, he can guarantee that he will be able to use more than 150,000 soldiers and more than 100,000 servants in any direction from the four counties of Chu.
In this way, if we recruit some militiamen and local warriors, the number of soldiers and horses in the army will be at least 300,000.
If it were replaced by areas such as Dongting County, the size of the troops would be close to more than half a million.
With this kind of strength, it can barely compete with those hegemons that often have hundreds of thousands of troops.
'But even so, given the strength of Chu State, it can only maintain troops of this size in one direction at most.
If we were to fight on two or even three fronts at the same time like the Zhou Dynasty, I would not be able to guarantee more than 500,000 troops in two or three directions at the same time.
Compared with those one-state overlords, although Chu State has barely reached the threshold of a little overlord, it is still far behind. '
Lu Yuan thought about his family fortune in his mind, and finally couldn't help but sigh secretly.
Although the power he established has developed rapidly since he started his army, in just sixteen years, it has grown from a few hundred troops in one county to more than 400,000 troops in four counties.
But this kind of strength is still far behind those big countries that have accumulated hundreds of thousands of years of experience.
Let's not talk about anything else, just talk about the population. The Chu State, with a household registration of only 8 million, can maintain its current standing troops of 450,000 to 60,000, which is already the limit.
The population-to-arms ratio of nearly twenty to one had already exhausted the Chu State's resources to the limit.
Even if Lu Yuan wanted to recruit troops again, it would be difficult to select more qualified soldiers from among the people under his rule.
And even if they could be picked out, with Chu's national power, it would be difficult to raise more.
After all, if there is not enough young and strong labor in the local area and no one is engaged in production and farming, who will pay taxes and provide grain and grass to the Chu State?
Without these, how could Chu support its army?
“So in the final analysis, we still have insufficient strength and insufficient foundation.
If the territory was large enough and the population was large enough, I wouldn't have to be as careful as I am now to expand my troops for fear of not being able to support myself. "
Lu Yuan thought of those old overlords who frequently expanded their troops by three to five million, and then thought about how he gritted his teeth and only added 86,000 troops, and he couldn't help but feel resigned.
Not enough, far from enough.
The current state of Chu is still too weak.
There is still a long way to go before it can grow to the level of Zhou, Liang, Zhao and other countries, or even to a level comparable to that of Ning.
Now all countries are taking the lead, and time waits for no one.
All people, all countries, are seizing the time to improve themselves.
If Chu State does not catch up now, if it falls one step behind, others will take one step forward.
Slowly opening up in this way, the gap will become wider and wider.
Now the Liang State, a behemoth with millions of soldiers, has appeared.
After other countries are stimulated and step up their efforts to annex small countries within their respective states, the second and third overlords that unify a state are expected to appear soon.
When faced with a powerful force that can send millions of troops at will, if the Chu State still only has the current strength, then even if Lu Yuan is now a master of the Immortal Condensation and the Second Level of the Martial Arts, he will not be able to protect the Chu State. Jiangshan foundation.
After all, this is the age of the end of the Dharma, and the immortal way is not prosperous. Although personal extraordinary power is important, if you want to reverse the general trend of the world, you still have a certain amount of power.
And this phenomenon will become more obvious as the spiritual energy is further depleted, the end of the law is further intensified, and personal strength further declines.
When the day comes when the spiritual energy is completely exhausted and all extraordinary things are extinct, the power of the group will completely overtake the individual.
At that time, gathering together is the right path, and walking alone is the wrong path.
Although Lu Yuan had already anticipated this day in the future, he had actually experienced it to some extent now.
Just like in myths, or records in classics, going forward a thousand years, it was said that at that time, the immortal masters and even the great masters of martial arts could defeat millions of armies by one person, and their power was unparalleled.
And after a thousand years, it is now this era.
Lu Yuan has almost reached the level of the first person in the world. He can think to himself that although he is strong, he cannot defeat a million troops by himself.
He put all his strength into an army of 100,000 and was still able to handle it.
But at the million level, even if Lu Yuan exhausted all his mana and used his true energy, he was no match for him.
If he really wants to fight against an army of millions, and finally dies of exhaustion, that will be his end.
The Age of Dharma Ending is not, after all, a world where the power of one individual suppresses everything.
"Therefore, for the sake of the future, we will set a small goal now to increase the population of Chu State to tens of millions, completely step into the threshold of hegemony, and secure the current position."
A population of tens of millions is the recognized threshold for hegemony in today's world.
Because only this kind of population can maintain more than half a million soldiers and mobilize an army of one million.
In this age of great strife, how can we achieve hegemony if we cannot send millions of troops?
Lu Yuan's Chu State now has only eight million people, which is still far behind this class.
The reason why it was recognized as a hegemonic country before was just because of its strong military power, which barely touched this level.
In fact, in terms of truth theory foundation and national strength, it is still a bit inadequate.
Sitting in this position now, I feel a bit vain and unstable.
Therefore, Lu Yuan's current goal is to cultivate his internal strength, and then continue to expand externally, so that Chu State can completely secure this position.
"Hanzhong County...Su Kingdom..."
Lu Yuan recited these two names, and a flash of fire flashed in his heart.
Around Chu State, these two directions are most suitable for development.
And no matter which of these two territories can be swallowed, the population of Chu State can jump to tens of millions in one fell swoop.
The next round of expansion target is one of these two.
