The winter of the second year of the first peace was coming soon, and the world was still chaotic this year, and it was developing towards a fragmented situation.

The biggest change was in Liangzhou, Han Sui suffered a big loss in the nest, and fled to Jincheng in a hurry. Song Jian's lair was beaten to pieces by Pang De's department, and when he returned to Wudu, he was bitten by Gan Ning's ambush soldiers, and now he didn't dare to speak in Wudu. Zhi Wudai, the first hero of the Battle of Luoyang, took advantage of the Korean and horse battles to come to the whole territory of Wuwei, and widely distributed soldiers and horses in various places, and his prestige soared for a while. Ma Yue recovered the entire territory of Hanyang County, not to mention the three counties under his jurisdiction, mobilized capable soldiers to build dock forts in Didao and Didao, and guarded the communication arteries from Longxi and Wudu Counties to Hanyang County, and alerted the forces of all sides with swords and guns.

Now Liangzhou is changing the offensive and defensive!

The second big change is that Sun Jian, Marquis of Wucheng, took the post of general of Zhengnan and sent him to Yangzhou, recruited troops and bought horses, and successively annexed Yan Hu, the heroic hero of Wu County, and Lu Kang, the Taishou of Lujiang, as if he was the first prince of the south to enter Wuhui.

No matter how the general trend of the world will change because of the immortal Jiangdong Tiger, Liangzhou Mumayue is still fighting to rule Liangzhou, the land that gave birth to him and raised him.

The return of the four generals of Ganning, Xu Huang, Peng, and He Man to Longxian means that this protracted war is completely over, and the first merit of this time is undoubtedly Jia Xu and Xu Huang, who have taken turns to fight against him, Guan, Gan, Peng, Yang and other generals also have their own merits. The three generals in the above table, Xu, Guan, and Yang are the captains, and Gan, Peng, and He are the captains. The rest of the military marquis and others did not press the table.

In winter, the snow in Liangzhou seems to have not stopped since September.

As the saying goes, the snow is a good year, and he doesn't know whether the snow in Liangzhou is a good year or a disaster year, but he knows that even if it is a good year, this heavy snow will make many people in Liangzhou never see a rare good year in the history of Liangzhou.

Ma Yue has been running around for the food of Liangzhou for the winter between the heavy snowfall, and the things that Ma Wan and others gave him at the wedding are indeed worth a lot of silver, and there are thousands of gold in a rough calculation, but they can't bear the many victims, and they spent a lot of money almost before the heavy snow comes. Then there was an emergency of military rations, which was not a fun thing, as soon as the army ran out of food, it was going to mutiny and rebel, but there was no more available resources in his hands or in the state and county.

Just when he jumped up and down in a hurry, the heavy snow in Liangzhou came, and in only ten years, the tribes near Longxian County froze to death no less than 1,000 cattle, horses, pigs and sheep, the herdsmen cried, and Ma Yue laughed.

He doesn't have to worry about military rations anymore, at least this winter, it's over.

Before the freeze, Ma Yue ordered Liu Bad to take some craftsmen to renovate the tomb in Zhangshan's hometown, and he also worshipped Pei Ying'er and Guta'er's spirits in the sky.

The two of them staggered back to Zhangjiachuan on the half-leg-high snow, which could not ride a horse at all in this weather, and the horse's leg could be frozen and broken after being tied outside for half an hour. Although the armor is cold, the heart wrapped in the robe is full of fire, the battle of Luoyang and the battle of Rongqiu have passed!

These two battles can be said to be a turnaround battle after a year of dormancy since the beginning of the Liangzhou pastoral, and from the day of the big victory, Liangzhou has changed its offensive and defensive situation!

Offensive and defensive changes!

But he did not recruit troops in a hurry, Song Jian, who attacked Wudu, or Han Sui, who coveted the resurgence of Dongshan in Jincheng, a hardwood pole and iron spearhead were continuously produced by the ironmaking department to store the arsenal, and the recruiting flag erected in Longxian County has never been put away since the day it was erected.

Two months after the war, the total number of recruits in each county exceeded 6,000. But this number seems to have reached a threshold, and even if the recruitment flag is still erected there, it will be difficult to recruit soldiers.

"How's that for the crossbow...... Can we do it in Chuanli? Tired of walking, Ma Yue took Liu Bad and the craftsmen to hide behind the big rocks and squatted in the snow with the wind on their backs, wrapped in robes and holding their hands in their sleeves and asked: "If our foot soldiers are equipped with crossbows, they will not be afraid of the advance of the cavalry when they form a salvo." ”

Liu Bad put his hands on his ears, the wind was still blowing with snowflakes, and his ears were already frostbitten purple and swollen and painful, but when he heard Ma Yue ask, he still smiled and said: "Envoy, it's easy to make a crossbow, the craftsmen dismantle the crossbow brought by Captain Xu, and they will basically do it." The materials are also arranged by the two brothers Zhang Shiping and Su Shuang, as long as the materials are enough, we will continue to make crossbows in Sichuan...... It's just that this cost is a little inappropriate. ”

"What's wrong with it?"

"You see, Liangzhou has a tradition of using bows since ancient times, and when the child is born, his father will make a bow for him, and when he is four or five years old, he will play with the bow all day long. Even if we make it ourselves, the material of a bow will only cost one or two hundred dollars. Liu Bad held his hand and calculated for Ma Yue and said: "But the crossbow is different, don't talk about the kind of small thing with one stone." But where there are three or five stone strong crossbows, the crossbow arms must be glued with hardwood horns, plus the cost of burning animal glue, a crossbow is more than a thousand dollars, if you want to equip foot soldiers, Hanyang County more than 10,000 soldiers, 10,000 strong crossbows can be 1,000 gold, and then counting crossbows and arrows, it is at least 100 gold. I can't afford to come up with that much money at home. ”

"Alas, I'm also worried about money, I'm afraid that this winter I won't even be able to get the money to reward the generals." Ma Yue frowned, the strong crossbow is a good tool for fighting positional warfare and defending the camp, but the high cost makes him unbearable, last year's tax in two and a half counties was only more than 1,000 gold, and he filled in the gold himself for a year of government, if there is no accident, I am afraid that next year will still be the same, if the problem of wealth is not solved, you can't get rich if you don't have money, where can you get strong if you don't get rich? Armaments and armed forces are all pushed up by money. "Put aside the crossbow matter for a while, I may still have a hundred gold over there, and then I will get half of it for you, and make five hundred first."

"It's not too early, let's go back first, it's too cold here." Ma Yue stood up, his legs were already numb, and he said while shaking his legs: "Go back to Zhang Shiping, Su Shuang, and Jia Xu, go to my house at night, we have to come up with an idea!" ”

……

Night, after the war, Longxian seems to have everyone's face with joy, close to the end of the year market under the order of the state to open until midnight, the wind and snow outside the city is very large, which makes the city post and wine shop full of customers every night.

The guards of the state pastor are the most tenacious men, Peng Shi and An Mu stood at the door against the wind and snow, although Ma Yue repeatedly invited the two of them into the room to warm up, but they resolutely refused, seeing that the year was over, although the Liangzhou army had achieved a great victory, but these guards' minds definitely did not dare to relax, for fear of sending assassins from Longxi or Jincheng to assassinate their state pastor.

The life of the family and the wealth of this life are all tied to the state pastor alone.

Indoors, Ma Yue walked to the door with two robes in his arms, and the moment he opened the door, the wind and snow poured in along the crack in the door, which made him shiver, and hurriedly handed the robes to the two, nodded An Mu and said, "You come in later, I want you to help me with something." ”

An Mu just caught the robe, and Ma Yue finally asked the two again: "Really don't come in?" ”

The two still responded, Ma Yue shrugged helplessly, and said, "Then you two can come in directly by yourself when you are cold, and your brothers don't have to see outside." ”

Saying that, Ma Yue went back and sat down by the fire and stretched out his hands to warm up, and it took a long time to warm up.

In fact, in all fairness, the winter in Liangzhou is far less than the situation of dripping into ice, even if it is located on the plateau, it is still not so cold, but the cold protection measures are not good enough, not to mention that there are not even cotton clothes, and the body is full of hemp, silk, leather clothes, the only thing that can protect against the cold is a robe, and it is strange not to freeze the ears.

"Do you know what cotton is?" Thinking of this, Ma Yue suddenly opened his mouth to ask, and then he shook his head again, and whispered softly with some self-deprecation: "Where is the cotton here?" ”

"Cotton? Envoy, what kind of flower is that? Jia Xu asked while roasting the fire, the old Wuwei people are well-informed, and there are few flowers in this world that he doesn't even know. The baby-faced Zhang Shiping scratched his head with a smile and said: "The envoy said that this cotton, his subordinates have indeed heard it, but they have heard it and seen it." Its flowers are like snow, soft to the touch...... Why, is Jun interested in this flower? ”

"Really, really!" Ma Yue's eyes widened, that is, he was surprised, and pulled Zhang Shiping and asked, "Where have you seen cotton?" Tell me! Where have you seen it? ”

"Make, make, light, light!" Zhang Shiping was suddenly caught by Ma Yue and startled, and stepped back while breaking Ma Yue's hand, realizing that he was out of shape, Ma Yue hurriedly let go and said: "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Shiping, tell me quickly, where did you see the cotton?" ”

"Zhangye, in the early years, I went to Shandan Horse Farm to smuggle horses, and many people over there planted those flowers in the yard, not to mention that they looked good, and they could grow to eight feet and one zhang." Zhang Shiping said, and asked Ma Yue: "Envoy, do you want this flower?" Could it be Madame? ”

"you!" Ma Yue scolded with a smile, took him over and said: "When spring begins, do you dare to go to Shandan Racecourse again, get me back cotton seeds, I want to find a piece of land and plant cotton!" ”

Zhang Shiping held his face and said: "This kind of thing must be daring of subordinates, it is nothing more than sending the brothers below, Zhang Shiping has never heard your order when has he, right?" ”

"Envoy, we don't have enough food to eat." Jia Xu suddenly said at this time: "I think that after the beginning of spring, the top priority is to dig ditches and drain ditches in Hanyang, not to plant cotton to waste the already small amount of land." ”

Ma Yue looked at Jia Xu, a smile appeared on his face, it is a blessing in life to have a wise man like Jia Xu who can plan well, how much can this great god help him do with his side!

"Wenhe, food is of course the most important, I have some preparations in my heart for opening ditches and repairing canals, and I will implement it in the spring. But this cotton is also very important to us...... With this flower, half of the people in Liangzhou can live in winter! ”