When he met the reasonable military master, Zhang Zhiqiao was secretly grateful, and hesitated: "The general forgives the sin, we can't give up the place where our ancestors shed blood and sweat to reclaim here." He looked at Zhao Xingde, the rain gradually became heavier, the general's face was full of sincerity, the rain dripped down the gray cloud, and his more than 200 people also stood in the rain, silent, the spring cold did not subside, many people began to shiver in the rain, but they did not dare to leave, and their eyes showed pity. It is evident that these people will not leave their homes.

"It's not that I haven't suffered the scourge of the Hu people in previous years, but I've survived it, and in the future, maybe I can get through it, right?" This is the true thought in the hearts of most people, many people have never even left this radius of four or five miles in their lives, they are just a grass born on this land, and they will be pulled out of this land, even if they promise a future like mountains of gold and silver, their hearts are always reluctant and resistant.

The raindrops, crackling, fell on the sergeants and the people, and without Zhao Xingde's military order, the sergeants all faced this scene in silence. In the Xia Kingdom, forcing the people to move in an emergency requires the approval of the state and county protectors. Further action even requires the consent of the Zhu Guofu at the top. However, this is the frontier, it is the battlefield, there is no set of established systems and rules here, and the present and future of the people must be decided by the person who holds the sword. If the soldiers of the Xia State did not decide for them, it was the Liao army and the Jin soldiers who decided for them.

"The general is kind, be pitiful." Someone began to murmur, "Pity me, wait." "In the future, I will wait for you to set up an immortal tablet." At first, some people knelt down and kowtowed to the sergeants of the Seongying camp and begged for mercy, and the women wept while desperately trying to stop the children from crying.

Zhao Xingde frowned, he pointed to the nearest room, and said in a deep voice: "Let women and the old and weak go into the house to take shelter from the rain." ”

"Yes!" Jin Changtai agreed, but did not act, looked at Zhang Zhiqiao, and said in a deep voice: "Did you hear what the adults said?" ”

Zhang Zhiqiao was stunned for a moment, and then he reacted, and he was busy letting all the women and children of all families hide from the rain, so as not to get sick. Li Erniu's house is only a dozen steps away from here, although the three houses are not big, but they can stand more than 100 people when squeezed, and every window is full of heads, looking at the old men who are still drenched in the rain with anxiety.

Zhang Zhiqiao was grateful, and had a lot of hope, and said loudly: "General Rende, can you leave a way for the small people to live and not move away from their homeland?" As he spoke, his knees weakened, and he was about to kneel on the ground and kowtow, but before the clinker could be knocked down, a long swarthy lance came to his chin and stopped him.

Zhao Xingde said in a deep voice: "The rules of our army are to kneel to the parents of heaven and earth, not to others. ”

"Yes, yes." Zhang Zhiqiao said tremblingly, he couldn't remember when the Han army had more of this rule. He is a good citizen of the Liao country, and he has never dealt with the Han cottage, and Zhao Xingde's speech and demeanor are very different from the style of the Han army that he heard in the past.

Zhao Xingde looked at the more than 100 Liaodong farmers underground, with rough faces, ragged clothes, and calluses on their hands and feet, everyone looked at him with expectant eyes, secretly got rid of a trace of women's kindness in his heart, and said in a deep voice: "You were all born in Liaodong, and the cruelty of the Hu people, I don't need to say more." Now that the Liao State is at war with the Jurchens, they need grain and grass to feed the horses, they need to spoil the women, and they will sign troops to fight for them at will. The longer the war drags on, the more brutal the Hu people will become, and the more they will treat you like pigs and dogs. Now you beg for mercy, and if I grant your wishes, I will harm you. ”

His face sank like water, his words were as cold as ice, and the cold wind and cold rain provoked these honest people to have to face the bloody and difficult dangers of the future.

"What you can survive in the past does not mean that you can survive in the future. If you can hide from today, the Khitans did not give you to the tribe, and the Jurchens did not assign you to Mouke, to be cattle and horses, and to be slaves and maids, it does not mean that you can hide from tomorrow. If you don't follow us, when that day comes, you will only be slaves, your children and grandchildren will be slaves and slaves, your wives and daughters will spoil them at will, and every grain in your field must first honor the future master. If you stay, this is what will happen to you. Zhao Xingde said slowly. He looked at the pale faces of the rain, and there was panic, pain, sorrow, or anger in the eyes of these men, who had been pitiful and numb.

Zhang Zhiqiao understood that what the general said was the truth, and it was not unheard of that the whole village was taken into slavery. And Hu'er soldiers and horses passed by, looting and massacring were commonplace, and the people just couldn't resist it, so they forced themselves to be numb to it, and even when there was an opportunity to change their fate, they begged to be safe in this miserable fate, and did not want to take the slightest more risk. Ma Biaozi felt that what the official said was too right, and the men who led the seeds had to do it with him. Fang Lianjiang looked at Li Erwa's house, the women and children were taken away and he couldn't let go, but when he saw that the strange military master had been standing under the tree outside the courtyard, he would rather be drenched in the rain than keep a distance from these women and children, and felt relieved for a while, and he was less afraid of following them.

"I will respect your choice, and those who do not want to leave can stay. But the mountains need to be cultivated by cattle, and I will take all the livestock, and of course we will pay. Also," Zhao Xingde stared at these panicked and disappointed people, "If you have the title deed, you must collect it, after the world is peaceful, this house and land will still be yours, and it will be your children and grandchildren." ”

"Most of us don't have title deeds, house deeds, and so on." Zhang Zhiqiao smiled bitterly. The land here is vast and sparsely populated, there is wasteland everywhere, most of the Han'er were taken captive here, built houses, opened dozens of acres of land, according to the old man, the county government had registered the house and land tax in the original Hanchang period, but the books had been burned in the war. The Liao court was also too lazy to enthrone the real estate, and the annual tax was more and more. The deed written by the people in private, with the official seal is called the official deed, and the one without the official seal is called the draft deed, and now the people in this deserted village basically do not have it.

"Then I'll send it to you." Zhao Xingde immediately interrupted him and said, "When the military disaster comes, you can still come back, and there is no problem with passing on the house and land here to your son and grandson." ”

"Really?" Zhang Zhiqiao was puzzled, he didn't expect there to be such a thing as a land deed. "If it's true, then following them can't be regarded as abandoning the ancestral pastoral." Fang Lianjiang said secretly, and couldn't help but glance at the courtyard of Li Erwa's house again, and turned his face. The servant blurted out, "What about the land opened in the mountains, can there also be a title deed?" ”

Zhao Xingde smiled slightly: "Of course there is." His smile was so confident that the farmer would be skeptical. Seeing the general's kind face, someone dared to ask, "Why do we believe you?" ”

"That's it!" Kim Chang-tae said at the right time, took out a big seal from his baggage, and held it high, "The golden seal of my general's testimony will make a land deed for you." He took out another piece of paper from his bosom and shook it in the rain, which quickly soaked the paper, but the red official seal underneath was very distinct.

Where have the people of this deserted village seen the real official seal, they haven't even seen the notice, they have only heard of this kind of thing, even Zhang Zhiqiao only took the paper handed by Jin Changtai in confusion, and muttered: "Is it really okay?" He was full of doubts.

"It's really fine." Kim Chang-tae smiled slightly reservedly. This title deed is his offering. Melted a gold ingot to cast a gold seal for Zhao Xingde, and printed six words in regular script "The seal of virtue and protecting the people". It is used to make the title deeds issued to the displaced people. The format was also set by him a long time ago, and he brought out hundreds of copies in the leather bag, as long as he filled in the name of the owner, the size of the house and the land, and then stamped with the official seal, it was just like a decent appearance.

"It's a good feeling, it's a good feeling." Zhang Fu leaned on the back of Zhang Zhiqiao's shoulder and trembled a little excitedly. He had only heard the old man in his family talk about it, and he had only seen it before his grandfather was taken captive from the Southern Dynasty. The sample of this official deed was passed around among the people of Han'er, and the spring rain had been falling, and after more than a hundred pairs of rough hands, it was still intact, and almost all of them held it as if they were holding their hearts and livers, and even lifted their clothes to keep it out of the rain. In the end, Zhang Zhiqiao reluctantly handed it back to Kim Changtai.

"The general is virtuous, the villain is grateful, everything is arranged by the general." Zhang Zhiqiao said sincerely. Zhang Fu and Fang Lianjiang stood around him and nodded again and again. Zhao Xingde looked around and said in a deep voice: "If there are those who don't want to go, they will never be reluctant." He was answered by silence. He turned back to Kim Chang-tae and said in a deep voice: "Then make a deed for these people and arrange for them to clean up." ”

The coercion of the people of the eighth battalion of Chengying is far better than that of other Han army cottages, and the sergeants have rich experience in governing the people. During the Xia Kingdom, the Great Prime Minister's Mansion would even ask the soldiers to assist in the improvement of agriculture, and the entire tax and management system of the Xia Kingdom was also copied to the gradually expanding settlement of Phoenix Mountain. Respected people from the original Han villages were simply elected as protectors, and these people played a great role in helping to calm the uneasy feelings of the people.

For those people who would rather die than move into the mountains, the Chengying Battalion did not force them, but only established a company to protect the armor among them, as the eyes and ears of the people's protectors outside the mountains and a foothold. Kim Chang-tae secretly observed dozens of people and began to develop the Brotherhood of Volunteers.

In just half a month, thousands of families were relocated to Phoenix Mountain. Armed with rudimentary farming tools and a small number of ploughing oxen, they began to clear the land in patches under the supervision of sergeants. Although a large amount of grain was exchanged from Li Ruobing, Zhao Xingde was worried that the seeds in the south were not suitable for the water and soil of Liaodong, so he asked the people to sow as much as possible the seeds and rations left over from last year. The sergeants gave them rations from the south to partially replace the rations. In addition to this grain, Zhao Xingde also arranged for several shaded households to try to grow ginseng.

Because of the precautions of the Khitans, the iron tools in the hands of the people were extremely scarce, and many peasants even only had wooden hoes and ploughs, and it was extremely difficult to open up the wasteland. Zhao Xingde had to speed up his search for the iron ore veins north of Phoenix Mountain, and before that, the shaders began to collect and smelt the charcoal necessary for iron smelting.