"Your Highness wants to go to Qiongzhou to gain a foothold in order to recuperate and train the army, but do you know what the situation is in Qiongzhou?" The two of them expressed their hearts to each other, and after being excited, Ying Jieyan began to consider the prince's plan. He knew that this was not a simple matter, but related to the development of the next few years, more than ten years, and even related to the life and death of ******.

"Sir, I know a little bit, I know that the plague is raging there, it is a wild and poor place, the world is afraid of it, but the specifics are not very clear, and I ask Mr. for advice." Zhao Yu said that his understanding of Qiongzhou at the moment is only contained in the history books, and what everyone in the house said, but more is just rumors, there are not many people who have really been there, and Zhuang Shilin, who has been involved in Qiongzhou, is only limited to the left and right of Shenying Port, and has not gone deep into the hinterland, of course, he cannot fully understand Qiongzhou's finances, public conditions and military deployment.

"Although His Highness's move is bold, it is reckless." Ying Jieyan sighed secretly, his disciple didn't even know the situation in Qiongzhou, so he had to rush there, and the direct consequence was that he was caught off guard because of the underestimation of the difficulties, which made it difficult to gain a foothold.

"Sir, I understand that the trip to Qiongzhou must be difficult, but this is also a helpless move, our strength is too weak to match the enemy army, and the imperial court refuses to accept my suggestion, so we can only take a risk." Zhao Yu said helplessly.

"Your Royal Highness, as far as I know, Qiongzhou is far away from overseas, and it is difficult to use troops, and since Taizu, it has adopted the policy of 'controlling it according to customs', so that the local officials do not know the power of heaven, and the government decree is difficult to access, so that bandits are rampant in the mountains and seas, and the people are not allowed to be educated, and the people's livelihood is poor!" Ying Jieyan understood that His Highness really did not know the situation, so he told the story to the best of his knowledge......

After the establishment of the Song Dynasty, after Taizu Zhao Kuangyin Kaibao pacified the Southern Han Dynasty in four years, the whole island belonged to Qiongzhou, and set up a military administration to control the whole island of Hainan by Jingluo pacification, but did not set up a road-level administrative agency, but the whole island was under the jurisdiction of Guangnan West Road, and the army was stationed. However, the effectiveness of the operation of the government yamen is very debatable, and most of the officials sent to the island are degraded officials, and although there are many famous ministers, most of them are still messing around.

The aborigines of the island from the ethnic minorities collectively known as the 'Slang Nationality' and the Han residents who migrated after the Qin and Han dynasties to the current dynasty gradually formed a situation in which the Han residents were in the coastal plains and the Slang people were in the mountains and forests of the island. However, due to Hainan's backward transportation conditions and the uneven development of various regions at that time, this management system was difficult to sustain.

Under the situation of the great power of local officials, although the officials of the Song Dynasty had the setting up of the four prefectures of Qiongya and Danwan in Hainan at that time, and also had the number of 600 forbidden troops and 180 Xiang troops, but the composition was complicated, there were Turkish troops composed of sinners, Li soldiers composed of Li people, and Tan soldiers composed of Tan people. However, in fact, there are neither permanent officers and soldiers nor permanent military generals on the island. In order to maintain stability, the generals of the army did not hesitate to buy officers and soldiers to go to the island with money and bribe local officials with huge sums of money, and did not dare to go deep into the hinterland at all. In recent years, the situation has worsened, and the island is completely out of the control of the government, and the various yamen can only rely on the sea route to communicate with each other.

After the Sui and Tang dynasties, with the prosperity of the Maritime Silk Road, a large number of export goods such as silk, porcelain, tea, sugar, hardware and imported goods such as spices, medicinal materials, and gems passed through this waterway, and Hainan became an important supply place for the Maritime Silk Road. The boom in maritime trade gave rise to pirates who plundered merchant ships, many of whom became local tycoons.

Now the military strategy is not competing, entrenched in Yazhou Linchuan giant Chen Mingfu, Chen Gongfa, self-driving double-headed boat, known as "Sanba Chen King", occupying Luhuitou Fortress, with more than 50 village tax households in Linchuan, often "whale swallowing dance, haunting the coast, dare to exterminate the imperial court's goods". Piracy was rampant, so that few merchant ships that went to sea could return safely, and the berthing of the priests became an ornament, and there was no way to collect taxes and silver. There is no peace for the inhabitants of the coast, and production cannot be carried out......

Zhao Hao sighed secretly while listening, his estimation of the difficulty is still insufficient! Although Qiongzhou is still under the rule of the Great Song Dynasty, in fact, the only places where the imperial court has the final say are a few coastal states and counties, and some other places are occupied by pirates, and no one can control the area ruled by the slang, and the island has actually fallen into anarchy. Moreover, there were almost no regular troops on the island, only some slang soldiers under the rule of local officials and convoys composed of Tan people were responsible for transporting grain from the interior to the island, so it can be said that there were no available soldiers at all. And Ying Jieyan's next words made Zhao Yu's heart even more cool......

Before the Qin and Han dynasties, the production methods of the aborigines in Qiongzhou were mainly primitive fishing, hunting, and gathering. Later, the Hermes-Epitek brought advanced agricultural production tools and technologies with them, but they were small in scale, confined to a small part of the coastal plain, and could not meet the demand at all. This situation did not improve slightly until the introduction of Champa rice in this dynasty, but with the increase of population, the shortage of grain was still serious, and it was necessary to transfer grain from the mainland to meet the basic needs.

When talking about Hainan rice cultivation in historical notes, it often mentions the grand occasion of 'two crops a year' or 'three crops a year', and Zhao Yu realized at this time that most of them were recorded by the literati as anecdotes, and they could not be studied in depth. In fact, a considerable part of upland rice is sown in slash-and-burn mountainous areas or on high slope terraces, that is, the so-called 'shetian', and is cultivated extensively. The other part is planted on the dry land that can be cultivated with a little farmland infrastructure, although slash-and-burn cultivation is not practiced here, but it also belongs to the Yuanjiang field where water is scarce, and the yield is generally very low, but the upland rice is 'big and fragrant', which is praised by the world.

Looking at the actual situation in Hainan, rice cultivation was a large area at that time. Irrigation is limited and is concentrated in areas with abundant water sources, and the total area is not large. Combined with socio-economic factors such as labor, three crops a year are only limited to the southern Yazhou area, and actually only account for a small part of the area. As a result, the level of productivity of either cooked system is not high and varies from one another to feed the island's existing population.

Zhao Yu knew that in an agrarian society, agriculture was the basis of the handicraft industry, so it seemed that the handicraft industry in Qiongzhou would also be underdeveloped. And this is related to commerce, the local export is only agarwood, betel nut, tortoiseshell, brown sugar and other specialties and rough processed products, the output value is low, it is difficult to create large wealth. In addition, although Hainan Island was an important node of the Maritime Silk Road, becoming a safe haven, transit station and supply port for Persian and Arab merchant ships to and from Guangzhou, Quanzhou, Yangzhou and other treaty ports, but now the Song and Yuan wars were concentrated in coastal cities, which would inevitably affect foreign trade, and Hainan was naturally affected.

Industry and agriculture are underdeveloped, and the result of the commercial depression is that it is difficult for the government to collect taxes, and it is difficult to do anything without money. Coupled with political chaos, sharp internal contradictions, a weak agricultural foundation, lax armaments, and rampant epidemics, it can be called a place of death. And Zhao Yu went to Hainan Island to raise military expenses and expand the team, but they can't take care of themselves now, and they still need financial support from the imperial court. Then if you bring a large number of people to the island, it will be even worse, survival will be a problem, and the revival of the Great Song Dynasty will really become a slogan......

"Does Your Highness still insist on going to Qiongzhou?" Ying Jieyan looked at the prince's little face tight, his face became more and more solemn, and two forehead lines were squeezed out on his forehead, knowing that he also realized that he would face great difficulties when going to Qiongzhou, he stroked his beard and asked softly.

"There is no turning back from the bow, and this king has no way to retreat." Zhao Yu pondered for a moment, looked up and said with a smile. He had already figured out that staying in the court would definitely be a death, and now that Hainan Island is like this, Taiwan's pimple will be even more finished. Since there is nowhere to go, why not go to Qiongzhou to try, maybe you will find a way to survive, no matter how bad you are, you can still take someone to sail out to sea to be a pirate, anyway, this bullshit prince was also picked up, it doesn't matter if you have it or not.

"Your Highness, have you made up your mind?" Ying Jieyan was a little surprised in his heart, this kid had a sad face just now, but in a blink of an eye, there was no sorrow at all, and this face became too fast. Secretly worried that the little prince is not too broad-minded, that is, he is confident, according to his usual observation, it seems that the latter has a big face, but he still instinctively asked again.

"Hmm!" Zhao Hao nodded vigorously.

"In that case, the old man will ask one more question, how did His Highness plan if he succeeded?" Ying Jieyan knew that although His Royal Highness was young, he could no longer be treated as an ordinary child, and as a staff member of the palace and the master of His Royal Highness, he should try his best to assist him and give him advice, instead of making decisions on his own. But first of all, you must understand in detail what Your Highness thinks, and then you will have a target and put forward your own suggestions.

"If you want to gain a foothold in Qiongzhou, there are four things you must do: fundraising, recruitment, military expansion, and immigration, and the most important thing is to raise funds." Zhao Yu said leisurely, this problem is not a problem for him, the preparation of a new company is to do these things, raise start-up funds, look for talents in all aspects, recruit grassroots workers, expand the scale of production, now it is just a different word.

"What His Highness said is true, but the old man doesn't understand why fundraising is the first priority at the moment?" Ying Jieyan frowned and asked, he agreed very much with what the prince said, but he was a little worried about fundraising as the most important thing, he knew that it was not a good thing for a king to love money too much, if he was unscrupulous and tyrannical, or even plundered, it would be a profound disaster for the country and the people......