Time flies, thirteen years pass by in a blink of an eye.
Chudu, Baling.
On the wide official road outside the city, a group of people walked slowly towards Baling City.
Seeing this, pedestrians on both sides gave way and stopped to watch.
As common people in the imperial capital, these pedestrians are naturally not ignorant. An ordinary team would not easily attract their attention, but the row in front of them is really different.
Just looking at their appearance, everyone in this team had their hair braided and wore gorgeous furs. They looked a bit like nomadic barbarians, and they were nobles among them, but they didn't know whether they came from the snowfields or the northern grasslands.
Among the team, there were dozens of Chu soldiers in fine armor accompanying them, guarding on both sides. An official in a red robe took the lead and led these barbarians towards Baling.
This obviously well-established barbarian team naturally attracted the attention of nearby passers-by, and they all couldn't help but make curious guesses.
However, no one in the barbarian team, whether it was the barbarians or the soldiers of the Chu army, paid attention to these discussions on the side of the road, and just headed towards the city entrance.
"Your Majesty, Baling City is ahead."
When they were approaching the city entrance, in the center of the team was a four-horse-drawn cart. A middle-aged barbarian walked out of the carriage and said to a young man inside who was wearing a white wolfskin robe, with a slightly immature face and a noble temperament. .
Hu Yanbi looked at the middle-aged barbarian, smiled and nodded: "Uncle Hai, I understand."
The middle-aged barbarian in front of him is named Hu Yanhai. He is his cousin and the pillar of the Huyan clan. He is the second innate master in the tribe besides his father.
Huyanbi himself is the heir apparent of the Huyan tribe and the future heir of the clan.
Naturally, these two people of such high status came to Chudu not for fun, but to shoulder heavy responsibilities.
Hu Yanbi said hello to his cousin, then walked to the door of the carriage, opened the small window, and looked forward.
Wherever you look, you can see a majestic city standing on the plain.
Under the tall city gate, pedestrians and business travelers from all directions formed a dense flow of people. They lined up and went in and out of the city under the inspection of officers, soldiers and petty officials.
Just looking at the city gate, there are thousands of people queuing in and out.
As for Baling, the capital of Chu, after years of expansion, it now has twenty-four gates. It’s hard to imagine how many people can come in and out of this majestic city in one day?
I'm afraid it's no less than tens of thousands, or even one hundred thousand?
With this in mind, Hu Yanbi couldn't help but sigh: "What a prosperous and majestic city. Chu State can build this city. No wonder it can dominate a state and become the overlord of the world."
As he said this, Hu Yanbi felt a little sad in his heart.
If the various tribes in the snowy plains still occupy the Helong County and live well there, they will probably be able to build a majestic city in the northwest, right?
It is a pity that eight years ago, although with the help of the Chu people, the Xiliang people were finally driven away.
They even occupied the three northwest counties left behind after the Xiliang Kingdom was moved away.
But just a few days after Ansheng's birthday, barbarians from various northern grasslands came to kill him.
Just like the Tibetan people invaded Helong of Zhou State in the past, those grassland herdsmen also formed a continuous and overwhelming range of horses, taking turns to invade the five northwest counties occupied by the Tibetan people.
And after successive wars, the Snowfield Tibetan people, with a population of just over three million, could stop these prairie barbarians who were driven south by the cold wave and were desperate for survival.
However, within three years, the three counties of Xiliang Kingdom that were originally occupied were lost.
After two years of fierce fighting, more than 200,000 people died, and Hexi County was also lost.
Now, even the last Longxi County cannot be saved.
Their various units in the snowy plains have been exhausted and shed their last blood in the continuous battles.
In order to survive now, they even had to send envoys to Baling to proclaim their vassal status to the King of Chu who ruled the entire Jiangnan land, asking him to take in his tribe and accept the submission of all tribes in the snowy plains.
The people of Damo God, who have been inherited from ancient times and have tens of thousands of years of connection, have finally come to an end in this end of Kyushu.
"Ever since Chu King Lu Yuan swept across Jiangdong, gathered all the heroes, unified Yangzhou and proclaimed himself the emperor, and brought together the best of the state, the imperial capital of Baling has become more and more prosperous."
Hu Yanhai listened to his nephew's emotion and forgot about the turns outside his eyes.
At this time, their convoy had arrived at the city gate, and the Chu officials who were leading the convoy were going to contact the gatekeeper and let them open a passage for the envoy team.
Now a side door at the main gate is opening. It seems that it is a special passage.
"Eight years ago, when the Chu State defeated Xiliang and captured all its people, I led the troops back to Chu along with Huang Xinzhenren and escorted the people of Xiliang to Baling.
At that time, although Baling was also one of the most majestic cities in the world, with more than 500,000 permanent residents, it was not as prosperous as it is now.
I heard that over the years, Emperor Chu gradually moved wealthy people from Jiangdong and settled them in Yueyang Mansion, where Baling was located. Millions of people were moved there in one go.
At the same time, six million people who moved from Lingnan were also resettled in Dongting County, where Baling is located, and in the nearby counties of Xiangyang, Yuzhang, and Hanzhong.
These people have also stabilized in recent years, and many people have begun to gather in Baling, coming to the imperial capital to do business or seek work.
In addition, scholars from all over the country come here to take the academic examination.
After the unification of the Chu State, envoys, businessmen, and people who wanted to seek a future from many countries from all over the world came to Baling.
The gathering of countless people made Baling prosperous today. "
Speaking of this, Hu Yanhai thought of something and couldn't help but clicked his tongue: "I heard that last year Yueyang Yin's household registration statistics showed that there were three million people in the entire Yueyang Prefecture, of which Baling had two million, accounting for most of the household registrations. .”
Since Lu Yuan unified Yangzhou and proclaimed himself emperor, Yueyang Mansion, where the capital was originally located, was renamed Yueyang Yin. The chief executive was no longer called a prefect, but was called Fu Yin. The rank was generally two ranks higher than that of ordinary prefects.
Although Hu Yanhai is from the Xueyuan tribe, over the past twenty years, the connections between the Xueyuan ministries and the Chu State have continued to deepen, and the business and personnel exchanges between them have become closer.
Especially in the middle and later stages of the relationship between Xueyuan and the Chu State, the survival of each of their tribes depended on the help of the Chu State, otherwise they would not be able to survive in the northwest.
Under this situation, the heads of the various ministries of the Xueyuan people had to pay more and more attention to the Chu State, and began to study the various systems of the Chu State, understand the court politics of the Chu State, and care about the big and small affairs of the Chu State.
Even in order to stabilize exchanges, the Xueyuan people also opened an embassy in Baling, the imperial capital of Chu State, and specially sent envoys to stay here to facilitate communication between the two sides.
Therefore, in the snowy plains, the tribes were not closed to the news about Chu.
A tribal nobleman like Hu Yanhai could even be called a master of the state of Chu, and his understanding of the state of Chu might be better than that of ordinary Chu people.
"Two million people..."
When Hu Yanbi heard this number, his expression became even more gloomy.
Now, after losing three Xiliang counties, Hexi County, and most of Longxi County, their tribes in the snowy plains still have a combined population of two million people.
Maybe there are only a million people left.
Sighing, Hu Yanbi did not think about this sad thing, but looked at his uncle and asked: "Uncle Hai, do you think Emperor Chu will accept our submission?"
Hu Yanhai nodded directly: "Of course I will accept it."
Hu Yanbi was puzzled: "Why?"
Hu Yanhai stroked his beard and said with a smile: "Now we have 200,000 warriors in each tribe in the snow field, as well as five innates. With such a powerful force, as long as the King of Chu still has the idea of using troops in Zhongzhou, he will not Turned away in vain.”
After saying that, he thought of something and said: "And we Xueyuan people are not without foundation. Lady Ling is still in the harem of Emperor Chu, and she has given birth to two children for Emperor Chu in the past two years. She was promoted to the imperial concubine, and her status was only below that of the queen.
As long as Lady Ling is here, Chu State will be our backing, and Emperor Chu will not reject us. "
Hu Yanbi thought thoughtfully: "Uncle Hai is right. With the spirit girl here, we really don't have to worry."
In fact, Hu Yanbi did not know the legendary spirit girl and had never seen her before.
Because when the other party married into Chu State, he himself was not born yet.
However, for the great deeds of the spirit girl, who married a mortal with the dignity of a goddess for the sake of the tribes in the snow plains, and brought Chu State, a powerful ally, to the Tibetan people, the people of the snow plains were still extremely grateful, and it was widely spread.
Over the years, it is difficult to say that the Chu State has given all-out help to the Xueyuan people without the contribution of the spirit girl.
So they also have a backer.
Moreover, although Xueyuan has suffered successive defeats in the northwest over the years, its land has been lost one county after another, and even now it is almost impossible to keep the Longxi County where it last lived.
But this does not mean that the Tibetan people are weak.
Nowadays, the main reason why the Tibetan people have been defeated one after another is that there are too many attacks from the barbarians in the northern grasslands.
From the entire northern grassland, tens of millions of grassland barbarians have attacked the five counties of Yongxi in recent years.
In contrast, the grassland Tibetan people had lost all their blood in previous battles with Zhou and Xiliang, and their population was only three to four million.
When facing a prairie barbarian whose strength is several times his own, it is normal for him to be unable to stop him in the end.
In fact, in the battles with the grassland barbarians in recent years, the Xueyuan people have been extremely brave.
In order to defend their new homeland, more than 700,000 people were killed by various tribes in the snow plains, almost all the men in the tribe were killed.
Five Xiantian Grandmasters also died, including three kings of the Four Kings Tribe alone.
The spiritual master of Damo Cult also died.
The brutality of the battle was simply shocking.
And their results were extremely brilliant.
Nearly two million prairie barbarians died at the hands of the Tibetan people, and six innate masters also died, almost breaking half of the spine of the prairie barbarians.
Now, even though the Tibetan people have almost all surrendered to the Chu State, how can those grassland barbarians fare better?
Before Hu Yanbi came to the Chu Kingdom, he vaguely heard that some of the tribal countries in the Gobi Desert in the Western Regions seemed to be affected by the cold wave and had plans to migrate to the east.
Fifteen years ago, they, the Xueyuan Bo people, drove away the Zhou people and settled in Helong, Yongzhou.
Eight years ago, they drove away the Xiliang people again and occupied the five western counties of Yongzhou.
Now they, the Snowfield Tibetan people, were driven away by the grassland barbarians, and ended up hastily defecting to the Chu Kingdom.
Hey!
Let’s see what will be the situation of those prairie barbarians who drove them away and settled in the five western counties of Yongzhou in ten years’ time?
With this thought in his mind, Hu Yanbi no longer had any grudges about taking refuge in the Chu State.
The northwest side is basically a dead end, just like the Liang Kingdom in Zhongzhou, it has become the center of the whirlpool.
All forces take turns to appear in the two counties of Helong. You will stop singing and we will stop.
Countless people buried their bones here and watered the soil with their blood.
It is not a bad thing that the Xueyuan people can escape from here, enter the Chu country, and save their lives and inheritance.
Otherwise, do you really want to become the last Tibetan for that so-called homeland?
At this time, the front team started to move again.
But they saw that the leader of the team, Officer Chu, had already coordinated with the captain of the city gate and opened the side door.
At this time, he led the team and entered the city through the newly opened side gate.
Seeing this, the pedestrians and business travelers who were queuing up next to him couldn't help but cast curious and envious glances.
Hu Yanbi looked at this scene and suddenly felt a sense of hope.
…
Chu Palace, Qinzheng Hall.
"Your Majesty, the Tibetan envoy has already settled in the embassy in the city."
Sun Siwen walked in from outside and brought news from the Tibetan envoy.
"Oh, after all these years, these snow tribes have finally figured it out. Do you know that it is best to enjoy the shade under a big tree?"
Lu Yuan stopped reviewing the memorial, raised his head and said with a smile, "But actually, it's good to think about it. There have been Tibetan people in Helong these years, and they helped us block the prairie barbarians so that they couldn't cause trouble." Northwest Frontier.
Now the Tibetan people can no longer hold on and want to give up the northwest.
Those barbarians will definitely gain momentum after they take over Helong County. Our Chu State has been helping the Tibetan people before, and those grassland barbarians hate this with itch.
Now that they are bordering our Chu State, they may send troops to harass our Hanzhong County in retaliation. "
Since then, at the request of the Tibetan people, he sent troops to Helong to help them resist the Xiliang Kingdom.
Using the Tibetan people as the northwest barrier to protect Hanzhong County has become one of the basic national policies of the Chu State.
And since eight years ago, Huang Xin finally destroyed the Xiliang Kingdom and brought down this small powerful country in the northwest that had a chance to rise.
During the five years of fierce fighting, the Xiliang Kingdom attacked the Taoshui defense line several times, but was frustrated by the fortified city and found it difficult to break through the Chu army's defense line.
The Chu army united with the Tibetan people, and every year during spring planting and autumn harvest, they sent two to three hundred thousand horsemen, divided into dozens or hundreds of skirmishers, into Xiliang, harassing and wreaking havoc everywhere, and preventing them from farming.
In the past five years, the Xiliang Kingdom was destitute of people and soldiers. Two famines even broke out, and hundreds of thousands of people starved to death.
Coupled with the impact of the cold wave and military disasters, the limited national power of this small powerful country in the northwest has rapidly declined.
It only lasted five years and could no longer sustain itself.
At the time of surrender, one million of the country's population had died, with less than three million people left, of which less than half a million soldiers and horses were left.
As a last resort, in order to survive, Xiliang had no choice but to surrender to Chu.
So Lu Yuan ordered that all the people of Xiliang be moved to Yangzhou and settled in Xichuan, Hanzhong, Xiangyang and other places.
Among the soldiers and horses in his country, a hundred thousand elites were selected, and the remaining four innate masters in his country were incorporated into the Chu army.
In this way, Xiliang, a small powerful country in the northwest, was annexed by Chu.
After annexing Xiliang, Lu Yuan distributed the land of the three counties of Xiliang to the Tibetan people to reward them for their contributions.
He also wanted the Tibetan people to control the northwest and guard the border for Chu.
After all, the Tibetan people at that time, after a series of bloody battles, had a population of only more than three million. Even if all the people were soldiers, the number of troops that could be mobilized would only be about seven or eight million, at most, and they would not be able to make a difference at all.
Using such a weak tribe to guard the border can not only shield the northwest and prevent other barbarians from migrating to Yongxi.
The Chu State does not have to worry about the Tibetan people becoming bigger, so it can be said to have the best of both worlds.
However, after using the Tibetan people for eight years, it seems that under the successive invasions of the prairie barbarians, the other party can no longer hold on and is now thinking of surrendering and moving inland.
“Hanzhong is dangerous and fortified, with the danger of Long Mountain to the west and the majestic ridges blocking it to the north. The road in the middle is difficult and impassable for large armies.
Those grassland barbarians could only rely on the power of cavalry to cross the rivers and rivers.
But in Longshan, it is difficult for human legs to walk, let alone horse racing? "
When Sun Siwen heard Lu Yuan's ridicule, he also stroked his beard and smiled and said: "It's better that those barbarians don't come. If they dare to come, with Huang Xin, the real person, leading two hundred thousand soldiers to guard Hanzhong, they will never come back. Buried in Longshan."
Lu Yuan laughed: "Brother Sun is right. After these years of recuperation, I have two million Chu Xiong soldiers and forty-two innate masters.
There are ten counties and eighteen kingdoms in the land, with a household registration of more than 40 million.
With such strong strength, there are only a few million prairie barbarians, which is nothing. "
In his words, Lu Yuan was full of confidence and pride.
Since he integrated the two counties of Jiangdong and surrendered the monarchs and ministers of Ning State, Yangzhou under the rule of Chu State has entered the fast lane of development.
Especially after the six million people in the four counties of Lingnan and the three million people in the three counties of Xiliang moved to various places in the north and south of the Yangtze River, the population of the ten counties controlled by the Chu Kingdom increased rapidly, and local prefectures and counties were vigorously developed.
It has only been more than ten years now, except for the enfeoffed vassal states, the counties of Yangzhou and Yongzhou in Chu State have quickly returned to their former prosperity.
Even compared to the previous week and the previous Yue Shengshi, it was even better by a few points.
Today's Chu State can be said to have crisscrossed roads, villages and fields, chickens and dogs can hear each other on the roads, businesses are everywhere in the city, the people are peaceful, and the culture and military are prosperous.
The so-called peaceful and prosperous age is nothing more than this.
And as the person who created this prosperous age of divine martial arts, how could he not feel gratified and proud.
'I created this prosperous world now. These tens of millions of common people are protected by me. The troubled times in Jiangnan were brought to an end by me. '
Lu Yuan thought this in his heart, and the smile on his face became even bigger.
"The people of the Chu State are grateful for your Majesty's merits. Some people have already called your Majesty the emperor of the ages."
Seeing that his friend was quite proud of himself, Sun Siwen complimented him, then raised his hand and asked, "Your Majesty, the Tibetan people are requesting surrender. Do I, the great Chu, accept it?"
Lu Yuan said matter-of-factly: "Accept it, of course you have to accept it. How can you turn away the people and soldiers who are given to you for nothing?"
He pondered for a moment, and then said: "Tomorrow morning, you will bring those Tibetan envoys and I will receive them."
"yes."
Sun Siwen nodded and agreed.
