On this morning, a fleet of more than 20 painting boats sailed through Dongshi and sailed directly into another special waterway, which was equipped with water fences and checking soldiers, and its end point was the Jin Palace, which naturally did not allow ordinary ships to enter.

The fleet sailed into the waterway, and after a short time, it slowly entered the Ningcui Lake of the Jin Palace, Ningcui Lake is the Dragon Pond, Xue Tao renamed it Ningcui Lake to avoid suspicion, the fleet has come to the Calyx Xianghui Building to stop, everyone has gone ashore, after two months, everyone finally returned to their homes.

Although I usually live in the palace for a long time, I will feel a little boring, but after returning from a two-month trip, I feel the warmth and beauty of home, everything is so comfortable and free.

Xue Tao took a hot bath, put on a comfortable long skirt, and sat in his window pavilion to enjoy tea and jade as usual, and after a while, Dugu Youlan also came over, she sat down on a spacious and comfortable rattan chair, and sighed softly: "It's still comfortable at home, at least your feet are steady." ”

"You've been cruising around before, so I think you should get used to life outside."

Dugu Youlan smiled: "This time and that time!" At that time, I didn't want to go home, I felt that my home was a cage, and my martial arts were not bad at that time, but unfortunately it was completely abandoned over the years. ”

Xue Tao took a sip of hot tea, pursed his lips and smiled: "I was similar when I was young, I always longed for the outside world, I also joined a poetry club, I knew a lot of poetry friends, and there were two Japanese monks, and the poems were written well." ”

"Do any of these poets have a good mix?" Dugu Youlan asked with a smile.

"Me!"

Xue Tao pointed at himself and smiled: "I'm just mixing very well!" ”

The two couldn't help but giggle, only when they got home could they laugh out loud so freely, and they had to pay attention to etiquette when they were outside, lest they be laughed at by others.

Xue Tao rubbed a topaz carved ring on his finger, thought for a moment and said: "Actually, there are also those who mix well, such as Lu You'an, the waiter of the Ministry of Rites, Li Kui, the assassin of Fangzhou, and several long histories of the thorn history, all of whom are members of the poetry society, they were the best at that time, after the resumption of the imperial examination, they were the first batch of jinshi, and it seems that I will also let Cheng'er go to the jinshi examination." ”

"Eldest sister, how is the situation in Jincheng?" Dugu Youlan asked again.

"It should be fine! My husband is very strict about his safety, and I heard from my father-in-law that he came back once a few days ago, took a few clothes and left, and I will inform him to come back tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. ”

At the same time that his wife and daughter went home to enjoy comfort, Guo Song also came to Daming Palace at the same time, returned to his official room, and he immediately summoned the right minister Pan Liao and the left minister Du You.

When the two heard that the lord was back, they hurriedly came to meet them, and Guo Song invited the two to sit down and asked directly: "How is the locust plague in the Guannei?" ”

He saw the news of the locust plague in Wonju and Gyeongju in the newspaper, and Guo Song himself had personal experience, and he knew that once the locust plague broke out, it would not be a small disaster, and the locust swarm would become larger and larger, and there would be no grass everywhere he passed.

Pan Liao hurriedly said: "Your Royal Highness, the locust plague is indeed quite serious, and has affected more than a dozen counties in five prefectures, including Yanzhou, Yuanzhou, Gyeongju, Suizhou and Yanzhou, among which the most serious ones are Yuanzhou and Gyeongju, and the officials of each state are making every effort to organize the military and civilians to fight the disaster, and the imperial court has also allocated 300,000 stone grain and 50,000 barrels of fire oil to support the affected areas.

Du You next to him also said: "Your Highness, the state capitals and the people are still a little short of manpower, I implore Your Highness to send troops to participate in the extermination of locusts!" “

Guo Song nodded, "I have already sent 10,000 troops to Wonju and Gyeongju on the way to participate in the extermination of locusts, and if the situation is serious, I will continue to send troops." ”

At this time, more than a dozen guards moved to the sand table in the Guannai area, which was spliced together by four parts, two zhang in length and width, Guo Song and the three got up and came to the sand table, Pan Liao understood the situation better, and pointed to the sand table with a wooden pole and said: "The locust plague mainly broke out from Huai'an County in Gyeongju, and soon spread to Fangqu County and Luoyuan County, and then spread to Yuanzhou and Yanzhou, and then affected Suizhou and Yanzhou, but it was not too serious over there, mainly to the west. ”

"Is there a disaster in Lingzhou?" Guo Song asked.

"There is no news of the disaster in Lingzhou for the time being, but it is difficult to say, although the area of this locust plague is not very large, and there has not been a large-scale ravage, but there is no guarantee that the scope will be suddenly expanded, and I feel that Lingzhou is also very dangerous,"

"How long has it been since the locust plague?"

Pan Liao thought for a while and said: "It's been more than 20 days, because there was a serious drought in Gyeongju before, and it didn't rain for four months, everyone was worried that there would be an outbreak of locust plagues. ”

Guo Song was most worried that the locust plague would affect the autumn grain harvest, and he asked, "How is the autumn harvest situation in various places?" ”

"Your Royal Highness, the drought in Guannai today is already relatively serious, wheat and corn production have generally decreased by two percent, and now there is a locust plague, Gyeongju and Wonju are just the corn harvest season, the northern areas of these two states have suffered heavy losses, it is estimated that the harvest is only about 30% of last year's harvest at most, and the southern regions of the two states and other states have rushed to harvest grain before the locust plague spreads, and the losses are not very large."

Du You added: "Now the imperial court is most worried about Lingzhou, Lingzhou mainly grows wheat, and the wheat only begins to be harvested in mid-October, and the wheat is not yet ripe, so the imperial court hopes that His Royal Highness will send troops to strictly guard the border of Lingzhou to prevent the locust swarm from spreading to Lingzhou." ”

Lingzhou is not only an important grain base, but also an important fruit and grape production area, just in the autumn harvest season, Guo Song immediately mobilized Hexi, Longyou, Shuofang three armies a total of 30,000 people to rush to Xiaoguan, strict guard, to prevent locusts from entering Lingzhou.

.........

Xiaoguan is the strategic artery of the pass through Lingzhou, here is actually a hundred-mile-long canyon, on both sides are endless mountains, here is not only a military pass, but also the locust swarm north to Lingzhou must pass.

Guo Song mobilized an army of 30,000 to support Lingzhou to fight against locusts, mainly deployed in the northern area of Xiaoguan, after the locust swarm flew over the canyon of more than 100 miles, the grassland area below, they will inevitably land to forage, this is the opportunity to eliminate them.

Xiao Guan is called Liang Jun, that is, Liang Ju'er in the past, he has been stationed in the frontier for a long time, last year he was promoted to General Yingyang, transferred to Xiao Guan General Army, Xiao Guan has a garrison of 3,000 people, not only to guard the pass, here is also a strategic material reserve center, a large number of grain and grass and military supplies are stored, there are more than 90 warehouses, soldiers are also responsible for guarding the warehouse group.

In addition, Xiaoguan Town at the foot of the mountain was upgraded to Xiaoguan County ten years ago, built a city wall, there are about 2,000 households, most of them are soldiers' families, mainly raising sheep and donkeys for the imperial court to make a living, Xiaoguan has a 300-mile radius of pastures along both sides of the water, where millions of sheep are raised, and there are more than 200,000 donkeys.

Yuanzhou's big green donkey is strong, docile character, has always been an excellent breed of donkey and cart donkey, extremely popular in Guanzhong, many people have a big green donkey from Yuanzhou, the main production area of the big green donkey is Xiaoguan County, a year to export tens of thousands of donkeys.

The county magistrate of Xiaoguan County is Xie Changming, who has just taken office for three days, and he has not fully understood the situation in the county seat! There was an attack of locusts.

Early in the morning, Xie Changming rushed to the military camp in the east of the county seat with the county commander and the county lieutenant, which was a temporary military camp, and the 30,000 locust extermination troops transferred from all over the country had arrived, led by Liang Wu, the governor of Lingzhou and the hussar general.

Xie Changming and the three came to the barracks, reported their identities, and immediately a sergeant led them to a big tent, in which dozens of generals gathered together, and Liang Wu was discussing with the generals how to exterminate the locusts.

"Everyone, His Royal Highness the King of Jin requires us to strictly guard against death, not to allow the locust swarm to fly to Lingzhou, the locusts are also our enemies, I hope we don't take it lightly, don't take it seriously, if we fail to stop the locusts this time, it is equivalent to us losing the battle, not only can we not give a mission to His Highness, but we will also be laughed at by friendly forces everywhere, and even the locusts can't be defeated, so this time to intercept the locusts, we can only win, not defeat!"

At this time, a soldier ran over and whispered to Liang Wu: "The officials of Xiaoguan County are here!" ”

"Please sit down!"

A sergeant led Xie Changming and the others into the big tent and arranged for them to sit down.

Liang Wu continued: "The locust swarm flew out of the Xiaoguan Canyon, and it was bound to land to forage for food, so Xiaoguan is the first line of defense, and the grassland in the north is the second line of defense. ”

Liang Jun raised his hand and asked, "Dudu, Xiao Guan is going to set fire!" ”

Liang Wu nodded, "To deal with locusts, you must use fire to smoke it, I had experience in Fengzhou back then, and sprinkling sulfur powder in the fire is the most effective way to drive out locusts, this time the imperial court approved 30,000 catties of sulfur, I want to get 8,000 catties, and it is estimated that it will arrive the day after tomorrow." ”

"Dudu, there is a group of warehouses in Xiaoguan, you can't use fire, it's too dangerous, as soon as the wind blows, Mars will go to the warehouse."

Liang Wu was stumped suddenly, Xiao Guanli was indeed more jealous, and he actually forgot about this stubble.

"Let's talk about it! Don't leave me alone racking my brains here. ”