Qidu, Linzi.

Liu Xiang, who had just returned to the feudal state a few days ago, had already handed over all the affairs of the country to the internal history at this time; And he himself drank and sang all day long.

At this moment, Liu Xiang, whose eyes were scattered, was lying in the arms of a concubine regardless of his image, and raised the wine bottle from time to time.

In the hall, dozens of dancing girls are writhing gracefully with the soft sound of drums.

Near Liu Xiangzuo, there was a middle-aged man with gloomy eyebrows and eyes, who was also enjoying the dance music, and his palms were regularly patting on his knees, which was very pleasant.

In the midst of tenderness and comfort, a tall and mighty young man staggered into the hall, rudely pushed the dancing girl in the hall to the ground, and immediately came to Liu Xiang.

Boom!!!

Suddenly, there was a muffled sound, which startled the musicians who were beating the drums in the side hall suddenly stopped, and the hall suddenly fell silent, and the needle drop could be heard.

Seeing that Liu Xiang didn't react at all, and was still numb and accustomed to drinking, the middle-aged man on the side had to stand up and look at the hall with pity: "What does Zhu Xuhou mean by this?" ”

Hearing this, Liu Zhang, who was also drunk and red, turned his head slightly, sneered, and sneered: "Because of Wang Xiang, Brother Wang missed the supreme position, Wang Xiang is not ashamed, and he still has sex and dancing and drinking?" ”

As soon as Liu Zhang's words came out, the hall was even more quiet, and the dancers who were stunned in place suddenly fell to their knees and pressed their heads deep on the floor.

When the middle-aged man heard this, his already slightly gloomy face sank even more; immediately made a miserable appearance and knelt down in front of Liu Xiang: "Your Majesty, the Marquis of Zhu Xu!" ”

"Sijun! Erhugh has to quibble..."

"Enough!"

For a moment, Liu Xiang's fluttering gaze suddenly burst out with terrifying might, and swept away at a glance, Liu Zhang, who was going to kick the king of Qi with one kick, couldn't help but retract his big foot and lowered his head.

However, the light in Liu Xiang's eyes flickered for a moment, and then disappeared without a trace.

Laboriously getting up from the concubine's arms, Liu Xiang came to the prostrate Wang Xiang in front of him, and helped him up expressionlessly: "Zhu Xuhou lost his words after drinking, and his uncle never went to his heart..."

After saying that, Liu Xiang turned his head, glanced at Liu Zhang, and then returned to the seat at the top.

"Marquis Zhu Xuhou is here, but there is something important?"

Looking at Liu Xiang's numb and silent gaze, a burst of bitterness suddenly appeared on Liu Zhang's face.

"Brother Wang, we are not defeated yet!"

"Why should Brother Wang abuse himself so badly, why don't you leave a useful body..."

Before he finished speaking, Liu Xiang interrupted Liu Zhang in a cold voice: "The news from Chang'an, Zhu Xuhou has not heard it?" ”

"Your Majesty wants to split Chengyang County of Qi Kingdom, and use Jiazhu Xuhou to punish Lu's merits."

Glancing at Liu Zhang lightly, Liu Xiang raised his drunken drink again and took a sip: "Marquis Zhu Xuhou only needs to wait, and he can be the king of Yang, the city of Han." ”

Saying that, Liu Xiang sneered at himself: "Even so, Zhu Xuhou has also divided his family, thinking that he is a branch of the family of King Hui. ”

"In the matter of the sect, Zhu Xuhou still don't interfere anymore, right?"

Looking at Liu Xiang's indifferent gaze, Liu Zhang almost wanted to speak, but he couldn't say anything.

"That is, if there is nothing else to do, Zhu Xuhou will retreat."

"The widow will not care about the rudeness before the king..."

After saying these two sentences weakly, Liu Xiang lay down in the concubine's arms again: "Prime Minister Wang, send Zhu Xuhou." ”

Looking at the gloom emanating from Liu Xiang's body, Liu Zhang only let out a bitter sigh, and then pushed away Sijun, who wanted to send him out of the palace.

Liu Xiang only glanced at Liu Zhang's back as he left angrily, then raised the wine bottle again and poured it violently.

"Those who dare to divulge today's affairs, clan!"

With a cold reprimand, the dancers crawling in the hall suddenly trembled, and they didn't dare to raise their heads at all.

※※※※※※※※※※

Chang'an, in the Weiyang Palace.

As soon as he saw off a few old generals, Liu Hong didn't have time to catch his breath, and a message came from the palace gate: Uncle Hanzhong, he was ordered to enter Chang'an, please see Your Majesty!

Liu Hong, who had already made arrangements for this, immediately ordered: Uncle Tian immediately went to the Prime Minister's Mansion to take over the post of Secretary of the Young Mansion; See you tomorrow when you enter the palace.

It's not that he doesn't want to see Uncle Tian, but Liu Hong is worried that as soon as Uncle Tian enters the palace, he will say something shocking, which will put Liu Hong in a dilemma.

For example: restore the throne of King Lu of Zhang Yan, the son of Zhang Ao, and so on...

Therefore, Liu Hong arranged for Uncle Tian, who had a very personal relationship with him, and was also a worm who 'picked up a Chinese person', to go to explore Uncle Tian's tone, and also to explain what he could say and what he could not say.

Liu Hong believes that as a person who walked out of Zhang Ao's door, Uncle Tian should be able to clearly understand what Liu Hong wants to express.

The rest will be known tomorrow.

What Liu Hong needs to consider now is undoubtedly the issue of the upcoming Xiongnu mission.

-- Along with the military newspaper from the border area, there was also a brief description of the national letter carried by the Xiongnu mission.

There is hardly much difference from Liu Hongdi's guess: blackmail!

Out of his heart, as Liu Hong, who had experienced the humiliation of his family and country in later generations, was actually very disgusted with this humiliating 'diplomacy', and for the blackmail of the Huns, Liu Hong hated to go into battle in person, and had been with the Huns on the front line of the Great Wall!

However, the situation is not as rosy as Liu Hong expected.

Fang Cai, the old generals who were still in Chang'an, such as Li Shang and Worm Da, entered the palace together, and according to Liu Hongdi's vision, they deduced for Liu Hong.

That is: before the autumn harvest, the Huns attacked the first line of the Great Wall of the Han Dynasty for strategic purposes, what kind of outcome would it cause.

Liu Hong still remembered at this time that after he just opened his mouth to say the illusion, Qu Zhou Hou Li Shang didn't think about it, and directly threw out a sentence: If there is a war before the autumn harvest, the entire north will be out of harvest this year!

In order to transport enough soldiers, as well as weapons and equipment, and grain baggage to the line of the Great Wall, all the people north of the Yellow River must be used as people's husbands.

This alone is enough for Liu Hong to give up his tough plan and find another way - half of the territory has no harvest, and the impact is not as simple as halving the agricultural tax collected next year!

First of all, the harvest in the north is gone, and the people have no food to eat, so the court has to transport grain from the south to the north, and distribute it in the form of relief grain to the victims of famine in the north - as long as the harvest in the north is completely lost, everyone who is not released is a disaster victim!

In other words, if the Xiongnu invade the northern border wall between May and July, then next year, instead of collecting a grain of rice from the north, the Han dynasty will have to do everything in its power to turn the treasury upside down to deal with the famine that the north will inevitably face.

Such a huge price is not at all something that the current Han family can bear - it took more than 20 years for the treasury to go from nothing at the beginning of the Han Dynasty to barely breaking even!

If the treasury is once again in a situation where it can starve rats to death, then Liu Hong will have to spend at least half of his life as an emperor to restore the treasury to its current level.

And that's just the impact on the regime's finances after the war.

From the perspective of strategic purposes, the outbreak of a major war in summer and autumn would also do more harm than benefit to the Han family.

According to the deduction, if the Xiongnu were to attack the Great Wall in a group, the only way the Han family could deal with it was to mobilize most of the country's troops, people, and food baggage to barely ensure that the city would not be taken away; Other than that, the Han family got nothing.

As for Liu Hong's expectation, inflicting a certain blow on the Huns, in terms of the current state of the Han army, there is no way to talk about it.

- Even if the logistics situation is not considered, in terms of real-time combat power alone, the Han family is also at a significant disadvantage.

When Liu Hong asked for details, Li Shang, who had already left the army, once again refreshed Liu Hong's perception of the Han army at this time.

- Even eight years before Li Shang threw away the troops, when Emperor Xiaohui was there, the armor, swords, bows and crossbows and other armaments equipped by the Han army had reached the point where they had to be replaced.

Now eight years have passed, but Liu Hong can't find a single document on the replacement of weapons and equipment for the Great Wall Guard Troops!

That is to say, today, nearly 30 years after the establishment of the Han Dynasty, Liu Hong's elite and fierce Great Wall Legion is holding the weapons that the ancestors used to chop cloth, Han Wangxin, Xiang Yu, and even the pre-Qin warriors decades ago...

Liu Hong saw it with his own eyes, and Li Shang took a longbow from the guards waiting outside the palace gate and showed it to Liu Hong; On that bow, except for the number of Shaofu's cleaning and engraving several times, there is hardly any place where you can see that the bow is actually made of wood...

If it weren't for a tight bowstring on it, Liu Hong would have thought it was a handicraft made of mud!

This made Liu Hong worried about the combat effectiveness of the troops guarding the border wall of the Han Dynasty on the front line of the Great Wall - the border guards who were equipped with these father's swords, grandfather's swords, and even grandfather's bows from decades ago were simply impossible to bargain for anything in the face of the Hun cavalry group that came and went like the wind.

In addition to the problem of equipment and the problem of restraint of troops, Liu Hong once again faced a problem that made him feel powerless: food.

Last year, the north, including Beidi County, Yunzhong County, and Youbeiping County, basically suffered from grain failures to varying degrees; As a result, the agricultural taxes in these counties have been partially reduced this year.

From the reduction and exemption of at least half alone, Liu Hong can roughly estimate how much the grain harvest in the northern counties was affected last year - the most optimistic situation has also reached the point where the local county government cannot confirm that it will ensure that it will not stop grain under its rule when it is unable to pay all the agricultural taxes!

Therefore, none of the grain hoarded by the Han family in all the granaries in the north could be taken out for use in the war - in the case of a general poor harvest in the north and the people were faintly uneasy in their hearts, the granaries were the guarantee of the people's sense of security.

Counting, this is the third time that Liu Hong has fallen into a predicament because of food problems.

For the first time, the soaring price of grain in Chang'an forced Liu Hong to move out all the grain from Shaofu, and then he did not hesitate to 'grab' a batch of grain to avoid panic among the people in Guanzhong.

The second time, too, was the shortage of military rations for the garrison of the Great Wall.

This time, it was also because of the food, so Liu Hong could only helplessly calculate: how to deal with the extortion of the Huns, so as to retain some dignity and decency without triggering a war...

Grain!

Liu Hong clearly realized that whether he wanted to develop the country, improve the quality of life of the people, or want to escape from the Huns in foreign wars, Liu Hong could not escape the problem, that is, food!

As long as the food problem is solved, Liu Hong can do a lot; Otherwise, Liu Hong will forever fall into the current situation, looking ahead and backward, and in a dilemma.

After determining the first big goal, Liu Hong had no choice but to put it aside.

- Whether it is to develop agriculture or change the status quo of the country, Liu Hong needs to grasp the power first.

And at this time, between Liu Hong and the power of the country, only Chen Ping remained, extremely henchmen!

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