There is a small village called the big tea shed at the easternmost border with Jiyuan County in the easternmost part of the border of Xiuwuzhi territory, and there was no village here, but later someone built a tea shed here for passers-by to rest. Seeing that the tea shed business was booming, many villagers opened a lot of food stalls next to the tea shed, and slowly formed a small village.

The location of Zhang Shumo's hidden soldiers was chosen here. One is that it is remote and not easy to be discovered. The second is that it is backed by Jiyuan County, and in case of danger, it can quickly retreat to Zhanglu's territory.

Now it is the beginning of February, the villagers of the big tea shed found that half a month ago there was a team to the north of the village to camp next to the woods, and then a large number of people began to gather here, and now there is a huge village in the north of the big tea shed village, they call themselves the big tea castle!

On this day, Zhang Shumo took a few key personnel to inspect the village, most of which were simple wooden houses, and some people even lived in tents, but fortunately, they lived on the edge of the woods, and there was no need to worry about the firewood for heating, the only thing that worried Zhang Shumo was the problem of food.

"How many days can the food brought by Lord Zhu last?" Zhang Shumo asked.

Shi Niubao, the Shaofu in charge of finance, frowned: "If you go back to your lordship, now there are homeless people joining every day, and the number of people is still changing, so it is difficult to estimate." Yesterday, when the subordinates counted the grain, there were still about 3,000 stones! ”

Zhang Shumo pondered for a moment after listening: "Now there are more than 8,000 soldiers in the village, plus other displaced people at most, no more than 15,000 people, according to one pound of grain per person per day, then we will consume nearly 125 stone of grain a day, so that our grain will be eaten before the beginning of spring!" Speaking of this, Zhang Shumo looked at Zhu Qing: "Lord Zhu, I have to trouble you to buy some food!" ”

Because Zhu Qing provided a large amount of money and grain this time, Zhang Shumo directly named him Jin Cao Pengshi, in charge of money and grain. Zhu Qing's son, Zhu Man, was also named a lieutenant and was in charge of military logistics.

When Zhu Qing heard this, he immediately said: "Please rest assured, I have already contacted a number of landlords' estates to buy grain, and I can buy at least 10,000 stone of grain this time!" ”

Zhang Shumo nodded with satisfaction after listening: "With Master Zhu, our food problem can be solved!" In this way, Brother Shang will have to increase the intensity of conscription, and strive to expand the army to more than 15,000 people after the beginning of spring! ”

Shang Lei nodded yes, and everyone walked around and returned to a wooden house.

Zhang Shumo looked at Lu Li again: "Brother Lu, what news is there from Su Yi and Liu Ye recently?" ”

"A few days ago, Mengzhou City was reunited to Su Yi, and then Su Yi took the opportunity to order Xu Liang and the people of Mengzhou City to pay the conscription tax, and the families who couldn't afford it needed to hand over a man between the ages of sixteen and thirty to join the army, otherwise they would have to go to prison. After the implementation of this decree, Su Yi's financial resources increased greatly, and now he has begun large-scale conscription, and it will not be long before the number of troops will recover to 50,000. ”

Speaking of this, Lu Li paused and said: "Liu Ye's side is more direct, Qinghua City is small, and the source of troops is insufficient, so Liu Ye directly sent troops to capture Zhuangding, and now it is conservatively estimated that Liu Ye's troops have exceeded 50,000." ”

Zhang Shumo scratched his head after hearing this: "I thought we were developing fast enough, but I didn't expect them to develop even faster." Looks like we'll have to find another way! ”

Niu Zheng thought for a while and said, "Childe, the location of the big tea castle is remote and the supply of soldiers is insufficient. If it weren't for our propaganda in Xiuwuzhi, we wouldn't even be able to gather the number of people we have today. Therefore, the subordinates think that we can issue a decree that all households that have people join the army can be exempted from paying one percent of the tax, so as to increase the enthusiasm of the people to join the army! ”

Zhang Shumo shook his head: "The situation in Xiuwuzhi is different from that in Qinghua City. Ninety percent of the cultivated land in Xiuwuzhi is in the hands of the He family, and it is only the He family who is exempted from taxes and profits, and the people still need to pay rent to the He family, and there is no benefit at all, so it will not increase much enthusiasm. ”

"Since this is the case, let's talk directly to the He family and ask them to reduce the rent for the people, and whoever dares not to do it, we will kill it directly!" Pang Yuan didn't know why Zhang Shumo was so timid in dealing with this kind of thing.

"In this case, who of the clan squires in other cities is willing to accept us? When we fight, they will resist with all their might, and we will only gain more than we lose! Whether it is Su Yi's conscription tax or Liu Ye's arrest of Zhuang Ding, they have not harmed the interests of the clan squire, so naturally we can't do this! Zhang Shumo explained.

Pang Yuan was even more speechless after hearing this: "We can neither harm the interests of the people nor the interests of the clan squire, so what else can we do?" ”

Zhang Shumo thought for a while and said to Lu Li: "Brother Lu, I'll fix a book later, and you send someone to General Hu Gen of the Black Iron Cavalry, let's expand the scope of conscription and absorb all the hooligans in Jiyuan County!" ”

In the following days, Zhang Shumo sent people to spread the news in Jiyuan County, saying that the big tea castle was willing to accept the hooligans and distribute food to the hooligans, so the homeless hooligans came to the big tea castle with the mentality of trying it out. As the news spread, more and more people came to the Great Tea Castle, and the number of soldiers soon reached 20,000.

With the increase in the number of people, Zhang Shumo once again faced the problem of insufficient equipment. Zhu Qing originally purchased equipment according to 10,000 people, plus the 5,000 people who already had equipment, and there were still 5,000 people in the village who did not have all the equipment.

Zhu Qing left Xu Liang in a hurry, and many of his family properties were not sold for money. And the money he brought had already bought food, so he couldn't do anything about the equipment.

Just when Zhang Shumo was at a loss, Wang Hu thought of a way for him. Wang Hu's father Wang Tu would have made weapons, Wang Hu still remembered that when he was a child, Wang Tu had built a very small gun head, and the wooden pole was very lightweight, now since the army lacks equipment, you can put some waste weapons back into the furnace, into a gun head, with a wooden gun barrel, just convenient for new recruits to use.

In this way, Zhang Shumo finally pulled up a team of 20,000 people after scraping together, although the number is not much, but it is enough for self-protection!

Time turned, and it was already March. After the beginning of spring, more than 20,000 people in the village began to cut down the forests, reclaim the wasteland, and prepare for spring ploughing. Just when spring plowing was in full swing, news came from the north that Jingguo sent 150,000 troops to attack Dieling Pass!

After receiving the news, Zhang Shumo sweated in his palms, Liu Ye consumed a lot of money in fighting with him some time ago, and now facing an army of 150,000, I don't know if I can resist it.

Just when Zhang Shumo was worried about Liu Ye, Lu Li's subordinates came with news again: "Son Qiqi, after Su Yi learned that the Jingguo army was attacking Dieling Pass, he immediately ordered 20,000 troops to march to Qinghua City!" ”。

Zhang Shumo stood up violently when he heard this: "Nonsense! But angry to angry, Zhang Shumo quickly arranged: "Shang Lei listens to the order, you take 10,000 soldiers for spring ploughing, don't relax, spring ploughing is related to our food problem this year, don't be sloppy!" ”

After speaking, he said to Pang Yuan: "Pang Yuan listens to the order, you can set off with 10,000 soldiers and horses, let's stop Su Yi!" ”