In late April, the later generals Wang Tan and Hu Ben Zhonglang sent people to move the entire 300,000 stone grain from Yingchuan County before and after, which means that Chen Taishi and Chen Men Five Tigers are about to start their attack on Jiangdong Yishi.

Although he was worried about the safety of Jiangdong Yishi and his brother Zhao Yin, but in the current situation, Zhao Yu was powerless, although he had controlled the entire Yingchuan County, only Yang Zhai and a few other counties had a slightly weaker control, but this did not mean that he was qualified to resist the Jin State at this time, let alone have any chance of winning.

This matter is mainly reflected in two aspects, one of which is the permanent army of Henan and Nanyang counties.

Henan is a large county with a population of more than one million, slightly more than Yingchuan County, and in an emergency, Li Meng, who served as the commander, can mobilize 100,000 county troops at any time.

In contrast, the population of Nanyang County is much smaller than that of Henan and Yingchuan counties, but the Nanyang Army is a regular army, and compared with the county army, it is still stronger in general.

Sandwiched between these two large counties, Zhao Yu naturally did not dare to act rashly.

Second, that is, the aspirations of the people of Yingchuan County, to put it bluntly, it is to see whether the military and civilians of Yingchuan County are willing to stand on Zhao Yu's side against the Jin State.

If the public opinion is not on Zhao Yu's side, even if Zhao Yu can pull up tens of thousands of county troops and tens of thousands of county troops, and make up an army of more than 100,000 people, this army used to fight against the Jin State will not be able to last.

And this is also the reason why Zhao Yu turned a blind eye to Zhou Gong, Ju Sheng, Cao Wu, and Qin Yu, a group of righteous generals, who secretly spread the belief in righteous teachers - there is no contradiction between the two, and even Zhao Yu is happy to see these people secretly spreading rumors that are unfavorable to the Jin State and the imperial court.

Of course, if these rumors go too far, Zhao Yu will also pretend to track them down, such as asking county lieutenants from all over the country to track them down.

In view of the fact that those rumors were most likely from Ju Sheng, Qin Yu, Xu Ma, Xu Shen and other county lieutenants of the 'Righteous Master Surrender Faction', Zhao Yu asked them to trace the source of the rumors, which would definitely not lead to any results, his purpose was just to warn these people: An Fendian, don't attract the attention of the imperial court to me.

Fortunately, the county lieutenants from the nominal division Qu are quite smart, and Zhao Yu doesn't need to worry about this for the time being.

Speaking of rumors, by the way, there was a rumor in Xuchang County that spread rapidly recently, about the 300,000 stone grain that was taken away by Zou Zan and Wang Tan.

In the past two years, natural disasters and man-made disasters have continued, which is really a 'disaster year', since the first two years of the uprising of the righteous divisions, the imperial court has stopped collecting taxes on the "affected counties", and Yingchuan County, as one of the offensive targets of the Changsha righteous divisions, has naturally been included in the list of "suspended taxation".

However, it is a pity that although the taxation was stopped on the surface, Yingchuan did not profit from it, but took out more grain than when it was taxed in the past, and assisted the entire five counties of Henan, Liangjun, Chenliu, Chenjun, Runan, and Nanyang, so that in the past two years, Yingchuan County has obviously had a good harvest, but the price of rice in the counties in the county is still rising slightly.

This made the people of Yingchuan County both puzzled and angry: why is the price of rice still rising when there has been a good harvest in the county in the past two years? Why does the government still say that there is a shortage of food? Who the hell swallowed up the grain?

In order to stop the people's grievances and prevent them from betraying the blame, Yingchuan County issued a clarification notice, which basically means that the county officials and county officials did not swallow the grain, and the county did not have enough food, just because he Yingchuan County had to help the neighboring counties.

Not much to say, but all people have selfishness, especially those people in Yingchuan who do not have a 'big picture'.

Although the clarification statement in Yingchuan County cleared its own suspicions, it also made the people of Yingchuan County dissatisfied with their neighboring counties who 'borrowed grain' from them, after all, the borrowing of grain from these neighboring counties affected the price of rice in Yingchuan counties and had a direct impact on their daily lives.

Of course, in this matter, it is useless for the people of Yingchuan County to be dissatisfied, no matter how dissatisfied they are, Yingchuan County still has to follow the orders of the imperial court to assist the neighboring counties.

Even, the county guard Li Min also asked Zhao Yu's Governor's Office to issue a strong statement, the purpose of which was naturally to deter some restless guys from taking the opportunity to encourage the people.

This Li County Shou didn't know that in fact, all the counties in Yingchuan had already been beaten into the Black Tiger Society's branches, and no one could spread any rumors unless Zhao Yu acquiesced.

All in all, under the strong statement of Yingchuan County, the people of each county can only acquiesce to the fact that their county lends grain to neighboring counties, and acquiesce to a slight increase in rice prices.

It was in this situation that Wang Tan and Zou Zan sent people to take away the entire 300,000 stone grain.

The transfer of the entire 300,000 stone of grain naturally could not be done quietly, and soon, this matter spread all over Xuchang, and then quickly spread to other counties.

The people of Yingchuan, who first learned about this incident, thought that this was another batch of relief grain for 'aiding neighboring counties', but it was not until a few days later that they learned that this batch of grain that had been taken away was actually used as military rations for 'entering and suppressing Jiangdong rebels'.

It's all like this, and the court still has to fight?!

The people of Yingchuan were angry, leaving aside Yang Zhai and a few other counties in the northwest of Yingchuan that had not been attacked by the righteous division, but all the counties that had fought with the righteous division in the previous two years had a commotion of public opinion, because these counties had paid heavy casualties in that battle.

Of course, in view of the fact that Zhao Yu proposed 'Guantian to raise the army' a while ago, which expanded the scale of the county army in each county, the public opinion of these commotions was just a commotion from beginning to end, and he did not dare to do anything, that is, to scold the imperial court and the government, and to do anything else or to do something.

In this regard, Li Junshou did not know, and Zhao Yu did not want to care about it at all, so this trend of 'scolding the court and scolding the government' quickly swept through most of Yingchuan County, which greatly reduced the impression and support of the people in each county for the imperial court.

It is no exaggeration to say that even the official of the Governor's Office, a certain Commander Xun Yi, who was willing to reveal his name, joined the army, and was very angry with the '300,000 stone grain', first scolding the court for being inconsiderate to the people and continuing to expand the war, and then accusing Zhao Yu of not taking responsibility, preferring the people in the county to starve to please the court.

In all fairness, Zhao Yu's gas is still quite large, but no matter how big it is, he can't withstand being accused by Xun Yi every day, so he simply threw the pot to the county Cheng Chen Lang, and as a result, Xun Yi went to the county guard mansion to scold Chen Lang.

Of course, Chen Lang is not stupid, although he does not dare to throw the black pot back to Zhao Yu, but he can throw it to Li Junshou, after all, this matter is Li Junshou's decision after all.

Within two days, Xun Yi was ordered by Li Junshou not to enter the county guard's mansion without permission, so he had to return to the Governor's Office angrily, while dealing with government affairs, while staring at the dispatch of the county's granary, because as far as Xun Yi knew, the 300,000 stone grain was only the first batch of military food that was taken away, and then, he Yingchuan County had to find a way to raise grain and grass for the army that went to conquer the Jiangdong rebels.

What the? Why didn't this Xun join the army argue with Zhao Yu, who was a captain?

Because Zhao Yu ran away early.

After Zhao Yu threw the black pot to Chen Lang, he ran to Yingyang with Niu Heng, He Shun and others.

Avoiding purity is one thing, and on the other hand, Zhao Yu plans to open an iron-smelting and forging workshop in Yingyang County.

Since this year's spring ploughing and replanting has completely come to an end, in order to divert his worries about Jiangdong Yishi and his brother Zhao Yin, Zhao Yu decided to concentrate and devote himself to agitating his mining and iron smelting and forging soldiers.

He had already thought of the location of the two mines, which was nothing more than Kunyang, which was responsible for mining Yingshan, and Wuyang, which was responsible for mining Woniu Mountain, but the workshops for iron smelting and forging, he thought about it for a long time, after all, these two workshops have a large demand for water, and it is best to be close to the river, and it will cause a certain amount of pollution to the local area, so it is best to choose the downstream of a certain river, or a county with fewer villages downstream.

Finally, it is necessary to get close to Xuchang so that the Governor's Office can transport and dispatch the weapons forged in the future.

After comprehensive consideration, Zhao Yu initially decided to build in Yingyang, so in the case of being annoyed by Xun Yi, he personally came to Yingyang County to inspect the local environment to see if it met his hopes.

On April 22, Zhao Yu arrived in Yingyang County with Niu Heng and He Shun.

Not long after Zhao Yu confessed his identity at the gate of the county yamen in the city, Yao Su, the county commander of Yingyang, took the county Cheng Ding Hui and the county lieutenant Ma Gai to greet him in a panic.

"Xiaguan, Yingyin County ordered Yao Su to meet Captain Zhou."

"Yao County's order doesn't have to be polite."

Zhao Yu smiled and waved his hand, and immediately looked carefully at the Yao County Commander in front of him, who seemed to be in his thirties.

This was the first time he had seen the new county magistrate of Yingyang County, because this magistrate was neither appointed by Li Junshou nor by Zhao Yu or Chen Lang, but was parachuted down after being appointed by the imperial court—Changshe, Linying, Zhaoling and other counties were similar.

From the side, compared with Yao Su's restraint, the county Cheng Ding Hui and the county lieutenant Ma Gai are much more relieved, after all, Ding Hui is the person promoted by Chen Lang, and Ma Gai is simply Zhao Yu's subordinate, they will naturally not be as confused as Yao County Ling.

Immediately, Zhao Yu and his entourage were invited by Yao Su to his party room in the county office, accompanied by Ding Hui and Ma Gai, and had the courage to chat with Zhao Yu.

Yao Su naturally didn't dare to hide it, and truthfully revealed his identity as a 'protégé of Wang Taishi', which made Zhao Yu feel quite surprised - this was the first Wang Taishi protégé he had met? What is that princess doing in the royal capital? At first glance, how can it seem that disciples are being collected everywhere?

Of course, surprise is surprise, Zhao Yu will not look at him differently just because Yao Su is a disciple of Wang Taishi, let alone woo him, but this Yao Su is respectful in front of Zhao Yu - this person probably also knows the relationship between Zhao Yu and Chen Taishi, so he does not dare to offend in front of Zhao Yu.

In contrast, Ma Gai's inquiry to Zhao Yu was much more casual: "Captain, why are you here today?" ”

Zhao Yu didn't hide it, and said with a smile: "I plan to build two large workshops, one for iron smelting and one for forging weapons......"

Hearing this, Yao Su, Ding Hui, and Ma Gai were all very surprised.

It is no wonder, after all, mining ores, smelting iron and forging soldiers have always been the exclusive property of the imperial court, and if the local county has relevant conditions and wants to participate, it must obtain the permission of the imperial court.

And this kind of license, ordinary counties are generally difficult to obtain, after all, even if it is mining ore, smelting iron and forging soldiers, the imperial court is still quite sensitive to this, and it is easy not to issue a license.

But as the saying goes, there are special cases for everything, Wang Shangde can use his connections to let the court acquiesce to him to build a military market, and Zhao Yu can naturally use the status and connections of the county guard Li Min to let the court allow him to smelt iron and forge soldiers in Yingchuan County, after all, Li Junshou is also from a public family, and the court should still give this face.

Not to mention that Zhao Yu did not plan to build these two workshops in the name of a private person, but was ready to attach them to the name of Yingchuan County.

In fact, Zhao Yu could also do it through Taishi Chen's connections, but he was a little taboo about it, he didn't want to alarm the old man, or to put it simply, he didn't want to attract too much attention from Taishi Chen.

As for how to persuade Li Min, Zhao Yu is already familiar with this - just coax, this Li Junshou has a soft ear.

No, a few days ago, Zhao Yu told Li Junshou about this matter, and was asked by the latter when, Zhao Yu explained: "The price of rice in the counties in the county is rising day by day, and if this continues, there will be more and more people who cannot afford to buy grain, and they need to rely on the government to help, instead of raising them in vain, why not take the opportunity to build some big projects in the county?" For example, widening rivers and repairing official roads......"

Li Junshou nodded again and again, and then Zhao Yu took the opportunity to propose three major projects, two of which were to build mines in Kunyang and Wuyang counties and hire people to mine ore, and the remaining one was to build a workshop for iron smelting and forging weapons in Yingyang.

Zhao Yu explained: "Widening the river and repairing the road does not have a direct financial gain for the county, in contrast, it is better to build mines in Kunyang and Wuyang, transport the collected ore to Yingyang, and train it into weapons, which can be used for our county army, and can also share the burden of building weapons for the imperial court......"

He talked wildly about the employment of personnel, and Li Junshou also heard the smallpox, and said on the spot that he could communicate with the imperial court to see - this means that he has been moved by Zhao Yu's words, but because of the attitude of the imperial court, it is not easy to make a guarantee in advance.

After all, he has been an official for a lifetime, although his ears are soft, he is still calm.

"Regarding this matter, the three of them can rest assured that Zhou has already informed the county guard of this matter, and the county guard will petition the imperial court and ask for permission...... The county keeper is from a public family, I think this kind of face, the court will still give it, so I came to Yingyang in advance to see the situation and make some preparations. ”

Looking at Yao Su, Ding Hui, and Ma Gai, Zhao Yu explained with a smile.

Seeing that Zhao Yu had obtained permission from Li Junshou, Yao Su and Ding Hui were immediately relieved.

What's more, Yao Su was a little anxious to undertake this matter: "Duwei is as wise as a torch, and he can see the advantages of my Yingyang at a glance, as Duwei knows, my Yingyang is located on the bank of the Yingshui River, the river is not in a hurry or slow, and there is no exhaustion all year round, and there are few villages and townships downstream, which is suitable for the construction of the big workshop that Duwei said......"

Zhao Yu secretly couldn't help but want to laugh when he heard it.

He was not surprised by Yao Su's reaction, after all, as long as those two large workshops were built, as long as these two large workshops were beneficial to Yingchuan County and the country, then this was the official achievement, and he could show his merit for this: under the governance of Xiaguan Yao, how about these two large workshops.

Of course, he was not in a hurry to agree, but said with a smile: "There is no hurry in advance, it is better to let Zhou go to inspect it with his own eyes." ”

As he spoke, he glanced at Ma Gai and said with a smile: "If you don't mind, can County Lieutenant Ma be a guide?" ”

Yao Su has been the lieutenant of Yingyang County for a while, and naturally knows that his county lieutenant Ma Gai is actually the henchman of the Zhou Duwei in front of him.

Half an hour later, under the leadership of Ma Gai, Zhao Yu and his party rode their mounts to Yingshui outside the city.

After taking a look at the surrounding terrain, Zhao Yu asked Ma Gai, "That Yao Su, how is he doing?" ”

Ma Gai said with a smile: "It's still a bit contradictory, especially after the big leader issued the decree of 'Guantian Raising the Army' a while ago, but with Ding County, there is nothing that can be done about that Yao County Order." …… Without my cooperation with Ding Hui, his orders would not even be able to leave the county office. ”

"Hahaha."

Zhao Yu laughed when he heard this.

The situation that Magai spoke of was his purpose.

With his connivance, the county lieutenants of all counties wanted soldiers and fields, and their actual authority was far greater than before.

Under this framework, the county governor is just handling county affairs for the county lieutenant, and the county order appointed by the imperial court is purely a decoration, with or without it, the county government still operates.

After laughing, Zhao Yu asked Ma Gai: "You just said, how much is Yao Su and you still a little contradictory?" ”

Margay shrugged.

He is a county lieutenant who divides the authority of the county order, not to mention that he is in charge of the county army alone, and also occupies half of the official land in the county, how can he not have a contradiction with the county order?

He smiled and said: "Thanks to the blessing of the great leader, that Yao County Commander is still relatively familiar at present, otherwise, I can only ask the brothers in the association for a favor." ”

The 'Hui' in his mouth is the Black Tiger Society, and he himself is the hall master of the Yingyang Branch of the Black Tiger Society.

It is no exaggeration to say that he is a horse cover, and he eats both black and white in Yingyang County, whether it is the county army or the local forces in the county, he has to be obedient in front of him.

Zhao Yu smiled and didn't ask anything more, because he knew that Ma Gai knew very well about their Black Tiger Village.

Most people know more than him Black Tiger Society now.

"It's rare to come to Yingyang, let's sit in your house later, the eldest sister-in-law has seen it, and I haven't seen the second sister-in-law so far." Patting Ma Gai's arm, Zhao Yu said with a smile.

Hearing this, the corners of Ma Gai's mouth twitched slightly.

He knew very well how he married the second room that day, all thanks to the person in front of him.

However, it's not bad.

After staying in Yingyang for two days, Zhao Yu finally decided to build the two large workshops for iron smelting and forging soldiers in Yingyang.

Immediately, he returned to Xuchang to make various preparations.

During this period, Xue Ao led 20,000 Liangcheng troops and 6,000 Taiyuan cavalry to go out of Liang County, and the soldiers were directed at Jiyin.

At the same time, Wang Tan, the general of the garrison Chen County, led 50,000 Handan troops to the northeast and attacked Suiyang.

Subsequently, Zou Zan, the general of Huben Zhonglang who garrisoned Runan, left 20,000 Taishi troops stationed in Runan County, and led the remaining 80,000 troops to attack Pei County.

The shocking battle of the Jin State against the Jiangdong Yishi began.

The world does not know who will win and who will lose this battle in the end.

I don't know how long this battle will last.

But what is certain is that the Jin State's behavior of continuing to wage war regardless of the cost is destined to make the people in the world, who are already living in difficulty, even worse.