Liu Bei has a personal relationship with Guan Yu and Zhang Fei's buddies, after all, he is still above Li Su. His trust in Li Su is only accumulated over the past five years, and it is more at the career level.

Therefore, on the first day of Guan Yu's return to Chengdu to hand over the jade seal, he must have drunk behind closed doors, and finally fell asleep, talking about the parting feelings, what he saw and heard, and the cause and effect of the war and political situation for most of the year.

The next day, when he slept until noon and woke up, Liu Bei remembered that Li Su should be summoned and formally discussed how to deal with this jade seal - the exchange of the imperial court in the future will definitely have to be returned, this Guan Yu has sworn on behalf of Liu Bei, Liu Bei has not yet given birth to the ambition to possess, and he really believes that the Son of Heaven can be rescued.

However, people always have to do something for themselves, under the premise of returning the jade seal to the imperial court, when and what specific circumstances will it be handed over, what kind of posture should be kept in the past few years, and how to use it as a merit to ask for more rewards for themselves, Liu Bei must also have this idea, and it is also human nature.

Because he drank too much the day before, Liu Guanzhang was ready to drink some porridge after waking up at noon, and invited Li Su to drink together.

Liu Bei and Zhang Fei were already very accustomed to the porridge in front of him, but Guan Yu was drinking it for the first time, and couldn't help but be surprised: "What is this?" It is also refreshing to decant wine. ”

Liu Bei pointed to the raw porridge with shrimp, river mussels, egg skin, mutton, green onion and ginger, and floating skin in front of him, and said proudly:

"This is a new porridge invented by Boya after he arrived in the fiefdom, called boat porridge. I began to wonder why he chose this name, he said that it was made by Minjiang fishermen who caught fish, shrimp, snails, mussels, shelled meat, and boiled raw, so it was called boat porridge. He is now building water conservancy in his fiefdom, and he has heard that the people have saved a lot of effort in farming than in previous years.

He asked the Hou Mansion to pay for the construction of more boats, and rented them to the idle people to catch fish in the Minjiang River, and even the fish and shrimp had to be taxed and commissioned. But the people also have small profits, and they earn more, but they are also happy to be exploited by him. ”

Li Su's boat porridge is also for alcoholics to relieve hangover, protect the liver and nourish the stomach. Compared with the boat porridge of later generations, there are only peanuts and seafood, but they are replaced by river fresh. Peanuts are still in the Americas, lacking vegetable oil and fragrance, so they are replaced by sesame seeds, and the porridge is sprinkled with some fried sesame seeds, which doubles the fragrance, which is not inferior to the original version, but it is more expensive.

Guan Yu drank two large bowls and continued to add rice, nodding and exclaiming: "It turned out that the fisherman was boiling porridge, is it any wonder that this mutton looks like a fork barbecue cooked and dried?" The pork rind is also fried dry and foamed. I'm afraid that pigs and sheep can be stored for a long time? And fish, shrimp, mussels, and snails are used fresh. It's a pity that it costs oil, otherwise these pigs and sheepskin meat are convenient to transport as military food. ”

Brother finished drinking porridge? Li Su has also arrived? It's the end of April and the beginning of May, and the weather is quite warm? Therefore, Li Su's appearance image is indispensable waving his folding fan.

Merely? Calligraphy and painting on a folding fan? It was still painted by his wife, but the fan handle and fan bone were made of different materials, apparently newly created, using jadeite and agate, which are specialties of Nanzhong? Li Su is also working very hard to bring goods.

"Come? Berya, sit. Liu Bei beckoned, and went directly to the side, not to be hypocritical with Li Su, and to get straight to the point? Yesterday, Yun Chang brought back the jade seal of the country, saying that Zhu Gongwei, Sun Wentai and Jingsheng swore that they would be managed by me and returned to the court in the future. What do you think? When is the best time to return it? How should we arrange it in advance? ”

Today's occasion is still relatively private, why didn't Liu Bei discuss it with all the advisers in public? I just don't want my intentions to be known to ordinary subordinates.

When Li Su heard this, he was also slightly surprised? said some words of congratulations to Liu Bei and Guan Yu.

After all, Guan Yu returned with the army? Until before Uido-gun? The speed of travel is relatively slow. Therefore, there must have been a fast horse messenger to report in advance, but it was not so detailed, so Li Su had known about the existence of the jade seal for a long time.

Since it was a formal discussion of such a formal issue of right and wrong, Li Su no longer called him a brother, but said solemnly in line with etiquette: "My lord, I thought that the jade seal would be returned to the court immediately when the Dong thief was destroyed. ”

The conclusion is very concise and to the point, Liu Bei has no objection to this attitude, he is just very surprised: "Boya, listening to your tone, do you think the fall of the Dong thief is just around the corner?" ”

Li Su: "I don't dare to say that it is just around the corner, but in a few years, it should be expected." The jade seal is placed in the hands of the lord for two or three years, and four or five years for the long, and it is nothing. ”

Liu Bei: "Two or three years? Four or five years? After the Dong thief retreated to Kansai, he was strong and strong, and he didn't have to worry about the lack of food and grass and being surrounded and attacked by people in a roundabout way. There are still nearly 200,000 elite soldiers in Xiliang under his command, and the generals of Dong Zhu do not have several times the strength, how can they break through the four stops of Qin? Even if our army serves as the main force to fight Dong in the future, it will not be easy to break through Chen Cang -

Although I remember that it was a coincidence that you were by chance, when we joined forces with Huangfu Song and Dong Zhuo to deal with Han Sui, you took over the repair of Chencang's city defense for ten months, and helped dismantle some of the city defenses on both sides of the southeast and strengthen the northwest. Now it is the providence of God that can help us, but even if we leave Chencang for a while, our grain route is very difficult, and we can't even defeat the army of 200,000 tigers and wolves of Dong thieves in the field. ”

Li Su gave up his hand and analyzed: "Although we can't defeat the Dong thief now, our army still has time to fight hard and raise the people in Tuntian, and after it is completely pacified and integrated in one or two years, our army can at least gather 50,000 of the most elite soldiers." If it is the same scale as Liu Yan's original recruitment of Dongzhou soldiers, it is not a problem to gather 120,000 people.

Although the remaining hundreds of thousands of recruits cannot be compared with the veterans of the Xiliang Long War, as long as the equipment is well-equipped and the morale is high, it may not be impossible to fight. That's why I said, even if we don't rely on external forces, we will have the opportunity to challenge Dong Zhuo in three years, five years at the latest.

Although Dong Zhuo is half a generation younger than Duke Lu and Huangfu Gong, after all, he is a generation older than the Lord Father, and he is already in his fifties. If he is not impatient and enterprising, when he dies of old age, he will be the end of a thief in the history books, and no one in his clan can take over such a situation, and he will be a rich man at best.

I heard that since the entire imperial court moved westward, Dong Thief has recently requisitioned many people around Yixian and Jingzhao to build Yiwu. Fa Xiaozhi, the magistrate of Sanguan County, is a person from Yi, and he inquired the day before yesterday and reported that the city wall planned by Yiwu is seven zhang high and thick, and the walls and towers are all compared with Chang'an and Luoyang, and there are 200,000 people, and it will take at least one year to complete.

Dong Thief is leaving a way out for his clan because he is old and weak. Since he was worried about this, he would definitely be more radical and aggressive in usurping the Han. In addition, the Kwantung princes were not successful, and I heard that Yuan Shao and Gongsun Zan had killed each other, and Sun Jian also attacked each other with some Yuzhou officials played by Yuan Shao in Yuzhou and took Yuzhou for Yuan Shu.

At this time, as long as our army does not move, pretends not to advance northward, and lets Guanzhong ignore the war for a year or two, Dong Thief will definitely have the illusion that no one dares to do so, and unscrupulously speed up the progress of usurping the Han Dynasty. When the time comes, the more urgent the advance, there will be internal friction. Previously, Yun Chang went to Luo, which led to Zhu Jun anyway.

And now there is Huangfu Song in the court, and there are countless other ministers who are interested in the Han family, they may not be sincere in following Dong Zhuo, many of them are secretly lurking like Zhu Jun, in order to eliminate thieves from the inside. With these righteous people joining forces, we can speed up in addition to Dong Dingran. ”

Li Su really wanted to say that "Huangfu Song and Wang Yun can be counted on", but this kind of words will be sliced, so he can only analyze it theoretically, and cannot name names.

But these truths are true, and Liu Bei's confidence really increased when he heard it.

This is also Li Su's style of running the General Staff: there are many possibilities to support the Han Dynasty, let's prepare from the most secure and solid plan. If there is an unexpected surprise, it is even better, you can speed it up.

After solving the problem of confidence, Liu Bei only had two doubts left: "Then what kind of posture should we put on externally with the jade seal in the past few years?" With the jade seal in hand, if there is no change from when there is no jade seal, and even 'self-containment', will it make the world wonder? ”

Retreat and self-cultivation is a common posture used by Shu warlords. In the first three or four years of Liu Beigang's death and Zhuge Liang's reign, he also used the method of "sealing the customs" to lower the vigilance of Cao Wei in the north, and then suddenly switched on and off when the farming was almost done, which was the suddenness of the first time he went out of Qishan.

The strategy that Li Su discussed with Liu Bei before was also to put on a posture of retreat to lower the enemy's vigilance, but now Liu Bei is afraid of "retreat after having the jade seal, will people think that he wants to be the emperor of the soil like Liu Yan", this reputation is too bad.

Li Su also realized that this worry was right, so he took the opportunity to advise: "This is also easy to do, we can put on a little aggressive appearance, but it doesn't really provoke Dong Thief to be vigilant." It's already May this year, and Shu County was only newly decided at the end of last year, so it is not appropriate for the lord to leave. After the beginning of spring next year, the lord can move the Yizhou Thorn History Governance Office from Chengdu back to Hanzhong to show that he is personally seated in the north.

At the same time, the process of how the lord obtained the jade seal of the country, the people and princes of the world must have known through the oath. But before, the snake sword fell into the minister's ship due to the white rainbow through the moon, flew from the Chang'an Taimiao, and was transported to Hanzhong by the return fleet of the princess Wannian, which has not yet been publicized. Now, the information that the snake slashing sword's 'white rainbow flew up to choose the lord because of the will of heaven to avoid the thief ministers' has also been widely disseminated. In this way, the lord and the jade seal and the snake sword are all in Hanzhong, and they can follow the posture of Gaozu in the Northern Expedition to eliminate the thieves, hinting to the princes of the world, so that they will not suspect that the lord is self-reliant. ”

Liu Bei nodded, this is also simple, this year to completely stabilize the Shu land, next year the Chengdu Plain will be handed over to Li Su to govern, he took the center to Hanzhong to station, at least to move the banner of Yizhou Thorn History from Chengdu back to Nanzheng.

Maybe you can also learn from Gaozu's "Ming Xiu Plank Road" to repair the plank road of the slope.

Because although the Bao ramp road is the second dangerous road after the Meridian Valley, it is impossible to drive at all and can only walk, but the Bao ramp is less than the Chencang Road that can be driven by 400 miles, and the north exit of the Bao ramp is Wuzhangyuan and Yixian on the shore of the Wugong River, which can put on the posture of "raiding Yiwu and beheading Dong thief".

In this way, we also dodged the previous warning of Huangfu Song who advised Liu Bei not to participate in and ask Dong - we are pretending to attack Yiwu, not to attack Chang'an, only against Dong thieves, not at the imperial court, and we have no intention of "the princes of the clan directly bring foreign troops into Beijing".

Attacking Yiwu and attacking Chang'an are completely different in nature politically.

But Dong Zhuo must also know that you can't "repair the plank road" to attack Yiwu. Emperor Gaozu didn't use the plank road when he repaired the plank road, this is a gesture. Therefore, Dong Zhuo will not be vigilant.

After Liu Bei figured it all out, he finally asked for a personal reward: "If you can really cooperate with the king of the court and return the jade seal in the future, what kind of reward should you want?" ”

Li Su replied solemnly: "Since the lord pacified Liu Yan, many exploits have not been rewarded because of Dong Thief's control of the government. In the future, he will definitely be rewarded for all his merits such as Liu Yan, Ping Nanzhong, saving Luoyang, and helping to suppress Dong thieves.

I think it is most appropriate for the lord to be promoted to Yizhou Mu, the general of the chariot cavalry or other generals, and then let the Son of Heaven be crowned the king of Hanzhong. In addition, if the Dong thief is removed, the Xiliang army will definitely have a recurrence, and the princes of the court and the central government will be troubled by Pingliang. Yun Chang has the merit of saving Luoyang, combined with the previous merit, it is appropriate to be the Liangzhou pastor. Although it seems that the promotion is too fast, but the territory of Liangzhou Mu needs our army to take it from the rebels and Qiang thieves on its own, and the imperial court is nothing more than to give a name, and the three dukes of the court must be willing. ”

Li Su's arrangement is already to take advantage of the future "two or three months after Dong Zhuo's death and Wang Yun is in power" to get a large number of justifiable rewards. With the situation when Wang Yun first gained power, Liu Bei was really willing to return the jade seal to increase the legitimacy of Wang Yun's auxiliary government, and it should be possible to win a clan surnamed Liu as the king.

The imperial court officially canonized a former Zongzheng as the king for his military exploits, which is much higher than the gold content of the self-cousin Hanzhong king.

And this is not a violation of the White Horse Alliance, Emperor Gaozu said, "If you are not surnamed Liu, you cannot be crowned a king, and if you are not a hero, you cannot be a marquis."

But Liu Bei himself was startled when he heard it: "How can this be done, I haven't heard of the clan being crowned king because of this for many years." Wouldn't others suspect that I would ...... after the Dong thief?"

Li Su persuaded: "In extraordinary times, do extraordinary things." Even if there is no other thief in the future, the court will not be peaceful soon, and there are many places where the lord needs to make meritorious contributions to help the Han family. Even Yuan Shao and Gongsun Zan have already fought among themselves, and there are more than a few warlords who will not respect the imperial court in the future. If the lord serves the king and does not coerce the king, there will be no accusation. It's too early to say this, so let's see when the time comes. ”

Li Su can't even mention Wang Yun now, and of course he can't mention Li Dao Guo Yan - even, the butterfly effect has reached this point, and it is difficult to say whether it will be Li Dao Guo Yan who will make trouble in the future.

Li Su could only roughly deduce, thinking that with Wang Yun's posture of dealing with the Liangzhou army, the Liangzhou army would definitely be chaotic. But history has changed so much, in case it is directly Niu Fu's counterattack, it is not known, then there may not be internal strife and division in the Liangzhou army, it can only be improvised.

Li Dao and Guo Yan are still only captains now, and Dong Zhuojun has a much higher status than them.

Moreover, since Wang Yun's tenure is to be used to exchange the jade seal for maximum benefits, hypocritical tricks such as "three resignations and then acceptance" cannot be played, at most modestly once, anyway, it is just a king for merit. If you really resign three times, you will be said to be like Wang Mang, and you can't do it.

"That's it, it's too far, let's take the long view. Anyway, next year, I will move the administrative office back to Hanzhong and put on a posturing. Liu Bei decided to adopt half of it first, and talk about the rest later.