Outside the customs.

The leader of the Shoshen Department looked at his youngest son, and the balance in his heart swayed a little more in favor of the Thoth Department.

Last year, the whole north was cold, and a lot of cattle and sheep froze to death, and their big tribes were okay, how did they survive the winter, but in the summer, the grassland suddenly encountered a major drought, and a large number of grasslands declined, and the arid grasslands led to the appearance of locusts in a large number.

After a long time, the cattle and sheep that were already hungry and thin slowly died of exhaustion, thirst, starvation, and disease, and thousands of cattle and sheep carcasses were placed in front of them, but in the summer heat, they could not do anything but watch them rot.

They are not Han Chinese, and they have the luxury of salting cattle and sheep to survive the winter.

For them, salt is as valuable as gold.

The youngest son of Badol, the leader of the Strict Tribe, wept as he held a dying lamb.

The lamb had just been born for a short time, but because the ewes had no milk, they had to watch it starve to death. It couldn't even stand up, so it could only lick the tears from the face of Badol's youngest son.

Badol's youngest son took care of all the lambs in the tribe, and when he saw that the lambs could not live, he could not help crying even though he had been taught since childhood that "boys bleed without tears".

Whether it is a human or an animal, the cub is the foundation of the tribe's growth.

Now it is the lamb that dies, and when there is no food, the first to die is the child.

"Heroic Badol, I don't know what the situation of the road is this winter, let's go to the Ministry of Thoth and the Han people on their side! The Urud and Hujira tribes had already been annexed in early summer, and they brought back a lot of grain and salt to the tribe......"

"In any case, instead of starving to death, it is better to fight once, so as to live up to the reputation of a warrior!"

"Fighting a war is not such a casual thing." Badol has experienced several inter-tribal wars, each of which has resulted in the remarriage of women and the slaughter of young and old among the tribes. If you can avoid war, it is better to survive hard than to die.

The Tajiks, the warriors of the Shoshen Tribe, looked at their leader with a wave of disdain in their hearts.

Their leader has lost the ambition of his youth, and now he is hesitant to wait and see.

Now most of the tribes in the north have moved closer to the Thoth tribe and are ready to make a big move. If they delay any longer, they will not be treated well even if they go to join them when the time comes.

The first to join the Mangu tribe received the warmest welcome and became the staunchest ally of the Trottoth tribe. The Thoth tribe was originally the most powerful tribe of the Ten Tribes, but now they have divided half of the fertile pastures that have not been affected by the disaster for them to graze, and let the Han people who went north give them iron tools and salt, and now Manggu has not only not been affected by the summer drought, but has grown stronger.

Later, although Uruld and Hu Jira, who returned to Shun, were not as good as Manggu, they still received gifts from the Han people.

When the winter comes, everyone can't survive anymore, and they will return to obedience, what can they get?

A chance to be cannon fodder?

"The Han people are cunning, this group of Han people came to our north for no reason, just to take advantage of us." Badol was also an invincible warrior in his youth, but since he became the leader of his clan, he had to think more about the future of his clan, and he could not act on courage alone.

"But this group of Han people brought gold, grain, bows and arrows, iron tools, and salt!" Tajik's eyes were full of greedy light, "The Han people said, as long as you go south with them once, everything you grab will be ours, and they only need territory!" ”

The Han people are as weak as sheep, I heard that the Han people have also suffered disasters this year, and they have Han warriors as guides, why can't they fight to the south? The silk, women, grain, cattle and sheep of the Han people will be theirs!

Why are they freezing and starving here?!

"What if they take their own territory and don't give it to us?" Badol asked rhetorically: "What if we shed blood and sweat and laid down the territory, and they teamed up with the Han people in the Central Plains to leave us in the Central Plains?" What if they fight back? ”

"Now that we're all going to starve to death, instead of thinking about this, it's better to fight, and we're going to die anyway!" The Tajik voice grew louder and louder, attracting the attention of many members of the Ministry of Tranquility.

He is considered the most influential person in the Su Shen Department except for the leader. Tajik was the most courageous warrior since Badol, and in his prime he quickly became a champion and leader of many young people.

The quarrel between him and Badol caused Badol's little son to stop crying and look up.

Badol looked at the dead cattle and sheep and his youngest son, and looked coldly at Tajikistan.

"Tajik, Toth, and Han Chinese are rushing us to die, and I have to think about this matter. I'll ask the Ancestral God again with the wizard, and I'll talk about that tomorrow. ”

"But ......"

"Don't say it, I said tomorrow!"

“…… Be. ”

Badol's prestige continued to wane, and he still managed to repel the Tajiks.

"Han Chinese...... The battle of the Han people, why do you want our Hanhai Ten Divisions to shed blood? These Han people want to grab the rich land in the south, and all they can leave us is just a few fur things. Why should we become their vassals and not rob them ourselves? ”

Bardol squinted, calculating in his mind.

After so many years of development from Wei and Jin to Great Chu, many Hu people outside the Guanxi do not know how many years of annexation, integration and war have arisen. These were the most popular and remained from the many nomadic tribes, and there were ten of them. They called themselves the "Ten Divisions of Hanhai", and after three alliances, they divided their own grazing and living areas, and did not invade each other.

Hanhai refers to the vast area of the north.

These ten tribes, whose ancestors were Xianbei, Wuhuan, and Tatar, have been constantly merging and splitting for a long time, and have become tribes that speak similar languages, have the same beliefs, and have similar living habits according to geographical boundaries.

After the Yin Dynasty was attacked by Xihu, the ten divisions of the Hanhai Dynasty also had the opportunity to go south to the Central Plains to plunder, who expected that a vassal king of the Yin Dynasty took the remnants of the Yin Dynasty to strangle the north and the south.

Not long after, Xihu continued to increase troops to the north, and the remnants of the Yin Dynasty were scattered and withdrawn, but they were replaced by more elite Han Chinese troops and Xihu elite cavalry, who were not good at attacking the city, and it was even more difficult to move south.

Now that the newly established Great Chu State is rich and strong, and has no internal and external troubles, this Han people of unknown origin claim to be the descendants of the original Yin Dynasty troops in the north, and have come to find allies in order to recover their homeland.

I don't know if it's the will of God, the winter when this Han people came to the Guanwai encountered a big cold that is rare once in a century, and it didn't take long for even the rain to fall, and the grassland was a little yellow.

Originally, they were the ones who were asked for by the Han people, but as the crisis on the grassland became more and more serious, they asked for this group of Han people.

They had food, they had salt, they had iron, they had everything they needed.

They also had tens of thousands of soldiers, siege equipment, weapons so good that they had never seen them, and good war horses that the Han people rarely had.

They said that there were still tens of thousands of heroes in the pass, so they were waiting for the internal and external attacks to succeed in one fell swoop.

They all said very well, the most powerful thing for the Han people is their mouths, and they have moved many tribes.

But Dachu still has hundreds of thousands of troops, and there are countless men who can be conscripted into the army. And all the men who can fight in their Hanhai Ten Divisions together do not have 100,000, these 100,000 people are all the hopes outside the Guan, once the men are all killed in battle, only the old and weak women and children are left, what will be the outcome, the result is self-evident.

Badol had been thinking about it for months since the Ministry of Thoths had sent someone to persuade him, and after the Tajik left, he went to the old wizard's tent to do some divination, and finally came to a result that could be fought together.

It's just that on the second day, when he was about to convene the clansmen and children to announce the matter, he was angry by what his youngest son said.

"Father, they said that the Tajiks quietly left with the young men of the tribe last night!"

"What?!"

Lu Fu.

The Lu family's Lu Jun's strange illness had been cured a month ago, but there were some small red spots left on his face and neck, and his appearance was damaged, and it was impossible to recover.

After confirming that the disease would not be transmitted to others, the Tai Hospital notified the Chinese army to lift the ban on the Lu Mansion, but since July, the Lu family has been locked down for two months, and many changes have taken place in the imperial court, among which the scope and methods of disaster relief in Jiangnan have been decided, and Lu Yuanhao has missed many opportunities to fight for the recovery policy for the Lu family.

Fortunately, Chu Rui is not a completely ruthless person, and he still takes care of the Lu family, otherwise this time the Jiangnan Lu clan is afraid that he will be expelled from the Jiangnan clan from now on.

Although the daughter of the Lu family was broken, when Lu Yuanhao entered the palace to thank him, Chu Rui still treated Lu Yuanhao kindly, expressing his regret for Lu Jun's misfortune, and faintly promised that he would definitely match her to the royal family to appease Lu Yuanhao's heart.

Lu Yuanhao got the emperor's guarantee and went home to comfort his daughter, no matter what, as long as he became a national relative, the Lu family was not without a hard work.

Lu Jun is not a stupid person, the foundation of her family's south has been hit hard, and then she got a strange disease, and even the Lu Mansion was closed, so his father couldn't step into the court for a few months, which is interlocking, obviously coming to the Lu family.

She only hated that she had become the target of others to attack the Lu family, and she didn't know where she had gotten her way, so she let the gangsters touch her. I don't know what kind of terrible opponent can do such a thing.

As soon as his father saw her face, he sighed, she had been sick for half a month, but she didn't dare to look in the mirror seriously.

When his father came home and told her that the emperor had promised to give her to the royal family, she was truly relieved.

It's not because she can finally marry the prince, but because with her broken body now, if she can still help her family, even if she will be crushed, she will not give up.

Just when the Lu family was not completely desperate, the emperor's decree made everyone in the Lu Mansion like a lightning strike, and they couldn't smile at all.

Lu Jun, the daughter of the Lu family, gave Chu Yingnian, the son of the king of Xiangcheng, as his wife.

After the conclusion of Chu Yingyuan's case, in order to appease King Xiangcheng, the emperor soon named his second son Chu Yingnian as the prince, and gave him sixty hectares of land to enjoy the general food of an adult prince.

King Xiang Cheng has always been deferential to the emperor, and this time is no exception. Although Li Mao still has a posture of "killing relatives" in the court, Chu Lian, the king of Xiangcheng, is still grateful to Dai De for the emperor's love for Chu Yingnian.

At least on the surface.

If the Lu family hadn't suffered a heavy blow, and Lu Jun hadn't broken his appearance, this family affair would have been a good family affair. King Xiangcheng has no real power, and has Lu Yuanhao, the secretary of the Ministry of Rites who holds real power, as an ally in the imperial court, and the financial resources of the Jiangnan clans and the rich family of the Lu family as a reliance, and the Xiangcheng Palace's palace will have a lot of room to show.

And Lu Jun's previous marriage was the Xinguo Mansion, and now he is married to the prince of Xiangcheng, and he will be the princess of Xiangcheng in the future.

But the bad thing is that the Lu family is no longer the Lu family of the past, and the son of King Xiangcheng, as the companion of the second prince, is naturally a supporter of the second prince's struggle for the position of the prince.

There are already many courtiers who are thinking about who the emperor will choose to be the throne.

The four companions of the eldest prince, except for Qin Bin's family, who held military power, were either members of the clan or the widowed son who was not knighted, and Qiu Mu's father's official position was not high.

The two princes' companions are all good, and they also have an uncle's family, but this made Chu Yingnian marry Lu Jun, and I don't know what Lu Dao means. Are you afraid that the second prince will overwhelm the eldest prince?

Chu Rui's "checks and balances" not only appeased the Lu family, so that other courtiers would not have the chill of "rabbits and dead dogs", but also removed the hidden dangers of the future of Xiangcheng Wangfu to a certain extent.

Even if the Xiangcheng Mansion hated the eldest prince because of Chu Yingyuan's death, the Lu family, which had gone up and down, became his in-laws, and it would always become a drag on him, and it would no longer pose any threat to Chu Rui's eldest prince.

King Xiangcheng's fief is in Guizhou, which is remote in the southwest, and it is far away from Jiangnan, so there is no need to worry about what waves the two families will set off.

Xiangcheng Palace.

"It's too much of a deception! It's too much of a deception! Xiangcheng King Chu Lian swept the things on the desk.

"Everyone knows that the Lu family is going to be defeated! Lu Yuanhao, a literati who only knows how to read and is high, what kind of daughter can he teach? And he got a strange disease and broke his appearance, who knows what the hell has become of Lang Dao? Is my Xiangcheng Palace's Mansion a place for collecting garbage?! ”

King Xiangcheng's strategist looked at the four treasures of the study scattered all over the place, and couldn't help but shake his head.

Since the head of his family came to the capital, he has been unhappy everywhere, and the eldest son died unexpectedly, no matter how humble and docile he became, it still aroused the emperor's jealousy.

As soon as the saint is lost, the life of the clan will not be easy.

"It's not that bad." The strategist stooped down to pick up a valuable inkstone, and when he looked at the crack that appeared on it, he held it in his hand with pity.

Everyone in the world says that Guinan is remote and poor, but they don't know that Guinan also produces iron ore. Many Yi and Han people in the southwest will make iron tools, especially swords. There are a lot of iron ores in the fiefdom of King Xiangcheng that are secretly mined.

He used Yiren, and he was friendly with the local Tusi, and the amount of pig iron mined was staggering.

King Xiangcheng had always been reluctant to make trouble before, and he made a fortune in the fiefdom. Now that I have been repeatedly stimulated, I am afraid that I will finally get rid of the previous idea of shrinking my head.

"The so-called hundred-legged insect is dead but not stiff, although the Lu family has been hit hard, it is not without the strength to rise again. Jiangnan is already rich, the Lu family has many trade routes and channels, and there are many vassal clans, if the lord and Lu Yuanhao have a good 'communication', it may not be a very poor family matter. ”

"Now everyone in Dachu has looked down on our two families, but has given us the best chance to come out."

King Xiang Cheng held the bookcase in his hand and hesitantly glanced at the henchmen at home.

This counsellor has followed him for decades, and he has always relied on him for his meticulous and clever schemes.

"What do you think, sir? Please also consult me. ”

"Lord, the Lu family ......"

Lu Fu.

The prince has become a clan, and he is still a clan with no real power, a remote fief, and a lost sacred heart, and the Lu family's mood at the moment is not much better than that of King Xiangcheng, who roared and was furious at home.

Gu has always scoffed at the choice of this father and daughter, if she hadn't confirmed that Lu Jun was born from her belly, she would have to see if this daughter was wrong, why did she have so many ideas.

"You know that you are in a hurry now, and what you told your daughter at the beginning was that the prince was a cabbage, and you could buy it home if you bought it. Now that I have been slapped by His Majesty, I also know that I am ashamed, right? "The Gu family doesn't complain about the sky and people, and the second doesn't look for death and life, but it is still necessary to laugh a few words.

She can see clearly, a bunch of people don't want her Lu family to get up, even if her daughter marries well, unless she is married to the emperor, how should these people step on it, how should they fall into the well or how they should fall into the ground.

I'm not strong, I just rely on others, and I'm a fart.

"Didn't I expect there to be a big flood in Jiangnan!" Lu Yuanhao said angrily, "If I let my daughter take thousands of hectares of fertile land and tens of thousands of hidden households in the family as a dowry, you see that a few princes are not moved!"

"My uncle has long told you that the reclamation should not be too hasty and too extensive, at the beginning, the old and the young in your clan were forced to each other, and you should think of the consequences if you couldn't resist the pressure and allowed this matter. Now that the evil fruit has been tasted, and the daughter is also entrusted to a non-human, I see how you still toss. Gu straightened his hair and sneered. You continue to be angry here, I'll go see Jun'er. ”

Gu walked to the door of his daughter's room blankly, squeezed out a gentle smile at the door, and then pushed open his daughter's door.

Lu Jun was sitting at the table with a solemn face, copying the □□ scriptures.

"What are you doing copying this?" Gu picked up the "Tao Te Ching" in his hand, "What you should be looking at now is the genealogy of the Chu family, and the clan wife is not so easy to be." ”

The emperor personally decreed the marriage, which is different from the emperor protecting the two families. This time, even if the eight characters are so bad that the two families are ruined, they have to bite the bullet and make it happen.

In the entire Da Chu, I am afraid that only her daughter let the two emperors personally inquire about the marriage. This would have been a supreme honor, but in fact......

Ay.

Lu Jun heard the words "clan woman" said by her mother, lowered her head and tightened her skirt.

Although the Xiangcheng Wangfu is the county king's mansion, it is not much different from many people in the capital who hold the title of fictitious title and eat the old book. In addition to the good name, it can't help the family much.

What's more, her appearance is hindered now, and she can't even invite pets, and she can marry the prince of Xiangcheng, I'm afraid that others think that the emperor is very benevolent, right?

"Mother has already inquired for you, that son Chu Yingnian has been smart and clever since he was a child, and he also looks good. He is thirteen years old this year, his parents are very strict, there are no messy women around him, and now he is studying with him in the palace, and even the bachelor and the master say that he is very clever, and it is not a loss to you. "The Gu family knows that their father and daughter have big hearts, but the matter has come to this, the Lu family is no longer the Lu family, and the emperor is really kind to be able to marry this family.

I am afraid that my daughter will not hesitate to bring this resentment to Xiangcheng Wangfu and cause something like last time.

"Mother, I understand what you mean, I will learn to be the daughter-in-law of the Chu family." Lu Jun pulled out a smile, but a few red spots the size of small fingernails on her cheeks made her smile a little bitter, "I won't let you worry anymore." ”

"If only you could think it through." Gu Shi breathed a sigh of relief.

"From today onwards, the mother will begin to teach you how to survive in the back house and how to be a qualified clan wife." Gu Shi threw the Tao Te Ching in his hand at his feet.

"Mother won't let you have the spare time to copy this."

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