In order to alleviate the grain pressure, Xia Xue used her professional and technical knowledge and the high-quality crop varieties she brought from the future to establish some grain seed bases in the occupied areas, and strictly selected and trained a number of agricultural technicians. Let them be responsible for the cultivation and harvesting of these improved varieties and the subsequent extension of these improved varieties, including high-yielding sweet potatoes, maize, potatoes and other new food varieties of American origin suitable for cultivation in poor land. There are high-yielding rice that can be grown in various soils such as saline-alkali land, and it can be harvested twice a year, and if it is in areas with higher temperatures, such as Hainan, Annam, Jiaozhi and other places, it can even be harvested three times a year. If these new high-quality grain varieties are popularized, it is estimated that the pressure on food will be greatly reduced, but this will not be possible in a short period of time.

Xia Xue occupied many small islands in Pingtan, including the largest island, Haitan Island. Because it has found that it is a good fishing and seafood base, you can catch a lot of fish, kelp, seaweed, sea cucumbers, shrimps, etc., which are actually good food sources. However, in order to preserve the fish for a longer time, it is necessary to make air-dried fish, which can be kept for several years without deterioration, but air-dried fish need to build a wooden frame on the shore, which takes up a lot of space.

Salting fish is also a way, but unfortunately Xia Xue found that the salt of the Sui Dynasty was so expensive, and it was about to catch up with the price of rice. Xia Xue analyzed the reasons why salt was expensive in the Sui Dynasty, the first was because of the imperial court's salt monopoly law, which increased taxes layer by layer, which was extremely expensive, and a bucket of salt cost more than 100 yuan. The salt monopoly is the monopoly of the state, and in ancient China, the salt monopoly was also known as the ban. Since Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, various dynasties have implemented different degrees of monopoly on the salt industry. The second is that salt production is backward, with high cost and low output. The Sui Dynasty still uses the most primitive method of making sea salt, that is, the method of "frying" and "boiling", using a plate for frying, and a pot for cooking. Later generations have long used the "salt pan drying method", which has large output, low cost and simple technology. Therefore, Xia Xue chose large flat seaside tidal flats on many islands in Pingtan with mild climate and abundant sunshine to build salt pans. Assign special personnel to supervise and guard, and conduct technical training.

The salt pan is generally divided into two parts: the evaporation pond and the crystallization pond. First, the seawater is introduced into the evaporation pool, and when the water is evaporated to a certain extent by the sun, it is poured into the crystallization pool and continued to be exposed to the sun, and the seawater will become a saturated solution of salt, and the salt will gradually precipitate out after drying. Sunlight and wind are used to evaporate and concentrate seawater to saturate it, further crystallizing the salt. This method is chemically known as evaporative crystallization.

This salt-drying method not only does not require much manpower, but also produces countless times higher than the boiling salt method of the Sui Dynasty. Xia Xue used this method to greatly increase her salt inventory, and then in addition to increasing her financial income by selling at a high price to some foreign merchants, she also sold the salt price of the people in the jurisdiction very low, many times lower than that in other places, and the masses were all grateful to Xia Xue.

Due to the low price of salt for the people in the area under Xia Xue's jurisdiction, many people can use more salt to marinate fish, vegetables, meat, etc., so as to increase the preservation time of food and resist the invasion of famine years.

Xia Xue heard that in the Taimu Mountain in Funing, Fujian, the Sui Dynasty government had built a large granary with dangerous terrain and tight defense: Yong'an Cang. There are as many as 500,000 stone of grain stored inside. Xia Xue heard it, this is not a small number, if you save food, it will be enough for 300,000 people to eat for a year.

Xia Xue sent a few scouts to Taimu Mountain in disguise to conduct on-the-spot investigations, and came back to report that there was indeed a very well-defended and very dangerous castle in Taimu Mountain, with more than 1,000 defensive troops, but because it was located in a dangerous place where "one man is a man and ten thousand people are not open", if you want to attack this castle, it is estimated that tens of thousands of people may not be able to succeed in attacking for a few months. In the past, there were bandit rebels from the surrounding areas who united and organized 50,000 horses to attack, but there was no progress in the attack for several months, and more than half of them were killed or wounded, and finally they were flanked by the Sui army reinforced from Minzhou and Jianzhou, and almost all the troops were annihilated.

Xia Xue was not afraid of difficulties after hearing this, after discussing with Li Jing, she decided to personally lead a thousand elite soldiers to attack, no matter whether there is so much food in the castle, it is a good base, and it can be used for its own use if it is occupied.

Li Jing and the others felt that Xia Xue brought a thousand people to go too small and it was impossible to fight down, so they persuaded Xia Xue to bring more people.

Xia Xue smiled and shook her head, "How can you use a strong attack to attack such a dangerous pass, since you don't need to attack by force, then you don't need so many people." Rest assured, I have the means. ”

Xia Xue asked Li Jing to continue to lead his troops to besiege Minzhou City, which was relatively close to Yong'an Cang, to prevent the Sui army reinforcements from Minzhou City from leaving the city; Jianzhou City is relatively far away, even if the reinforcements sent will not be able to catch up for a while and a half, this Xia Xue is not worried, and hopes to fish out the main force of the Sui army in Jianzhou City and find a way to annihilate it.

Xia Xue personally selected a thousand elite soldiers from the main army of the Angel Army and the black-clothed guards, and set off to Taimu Mountain with Dugu Jun, Pan Jiang, and Ouyang brothers and sisters.

When you arrive at Taimu Mountain, you find that Taimu Mountain stands on the coast of the East China Sea, faces the sea on three sides, backs the mountain on one side, is majestic and beautiful, the momentum is majestic, the strange rocks and strange stones, the postures are varied, the scenery is unique, and it is a wonder. In the mountains, there are steep mountains, strange stones, strange holes, cliffs, peaks, stone eggs, meandering streams, high waterfalls, big islands, golden sands, and beautiful reefs.

Xia Xue let the troops hide in the mountains and forests, and she and a spy quietly touched in. After walking for about half a day, under the guidance of the spies, Xia Xue saw a tall and heavy castle standing at the end of the middle of a mountain road that was steep on both sides like a mountain gate.

This castle is said to have a thousand people, and even tens of thousands of people will be difficult to capture. The first way to the castle was a very narrow mountain road, that is, no matter how many people there were, it could not be opened, and the siege equipment could not be used; The city wall is high and thick, the city gate is not only thick and strong, but also there is a jack gate inside, which is really easy to defend and difficult to attack.

Xia Xue frowned and thought about a way, a strong attack would definitely not work, so how could she attack skillfully?

Suddenly, she noticed a faint mist floating around her, and she couldn't help but have a flash of inspiration in her heart.

Xia Xue immediately returned to the mountains and forests where the troops were hidden, and asked everyone to hurry up to eat and rest, but they were not allowed to light a fire, and they would wait for the fog to be heavy tomorrow morning. Everyone wondered how Xia Xue could calculate that there would be heavy fog tomorrow morning.

In the early morning of the next day, the Taimu Mountain was really foggy, and it was so white that it was difficult to see things clearly from a meter away. Everyone secretly called God and praised Xia Xue for being a "Nine Heavens Fairy". I thought she was casting some spell to summon the fog.

Xia Xue didn't explain, she knew that the ancients were superstitious, and sometimes she made herself a little mysterious, which was conducive to increasing her appeal and prestige.

In fact, Xia Xue found that there was a heavy rain on Taimu Mountain yesterday morning, and it became a sunny day after the rain stopped at noon, the sun was shining, a lot of water vapor evaporated on the ground, and the air humidity was very high, plus the atmosphere of Taimu Mountain was stable and there was no wind in the past few days.

For those with modern scientific and technological knowledge, Xia Xue knows that when the air near the ground is cooled to a certain extent, the water vapor in the air will condense into tiny water droplets suspended in the air, and a fog with reduced visibility will be formed.

Now that Fujian has entered winter, although the temperature in the south is higher than that in the north, it is also colder in the morning and evening. In winter, the night time becomes longer, and the ground heat dissipation is more rapid than in summer, so that the ground temperature drops sharply, and the air humidity is very high, and there is no strong wind, so that the water vapor in the air near the ground is easy to reach saturation in the second half of the night to the morning and condense into small water droplets, forming fog. In autumn and winter, the morning temperature is the lowest, and the fog is at its thickest.

So this morning, the fog was thick, which had already been expected by Xia Xue, but she didn't expect the fog to be so big, even bigger than she predicted, and she could barely see things on the other side. But now the fog is bigger and thicker, the more favorable it is for sneak attacks.

Xia Xue looked at the thick fog and excitedly shouted in her heart: "God help me!" ”

The opportunity could not be missed, and she immediately led a thousand elite soldiers to quietly come to Yong'an Cangcheng under the protection of the fog.

Xia Xue looked up and saw that she couldn't see anything in the white clouds, and it was estimated that the defenders above couldn't see them either. She took out the multi-functional telescope she had brought from the future for the field surgery, turned on the infrared and thermal imaging functions and looked up the castle tower, and found that there was no one on the city wall now, and there were more than a hundred soldiers crowded in the castle tower. It is estimated that the rest of the soldiers are sleeping soundly, and the early morning of winter is not only cold, but also the time when people are most tired. No one could have imagined that in such a thick fog, someone would come to attack the city.

After Xia Xue put the binoculars away, she quietly checked her helmet and clothes, glanced at her watch, and then took out her special ejection hook and shot it towards the city head more than five zhang high.

For Xia Xue, who has climbed many dangerous mountains and cliffs with his bare hands, this five-zhang high city wall is simply pediatric. After a while, Xia Xue had arrived safely on the city wall, and she put away the hook and hung it behind her left waist.

Then he took the ropes he had been carrying when he came up from his shoulders, tied them to the battlements, and hung down quietly.

After a while, Ouyang Qian also climbed up, Xia Xue gestured for her to take care of it here, and went to the front to inquire by herself. Ouyang Qian also brought a rope, and also hung down the city wall, so that two people could come up at the same time each time, each with a rope, and then hang down, so that more and more people climbed up each time.

Xia Xue took out a multi-purpose telescope and used infrared and thermal imaging functions to closely monitor the guards in the city tower. Seeing that they were unaware, they were still dozing in the room.

After more than an hour, more than a thousand angel troops all climbed the city wall, these are all elite soldiers carefully selected by Xia Xue who are good at climbing and have superb martial arts, so the speed of climbing the wall is relatively fast.

Xia Xue commanded in tactical sign language, and asked Dugu Jun and Ouyang Yong to lead 600 people to the city to clean up the Sui army in the barracks, and asked Pan Jiang and Ouyang Qian to take 300 people to clean up the Sui army guarding the city gate. He led the remaining hundred men to clean up the guards in the tower.

The three elite soldiers set off at the same time, Xia Xue put the binoculars, now that the sun is about to rise, the dense fog is about to disperse, and you need to start as soon as possible.

As soon as he came to the gate of the city tower, a Sui soldier walked out, probably wanting to urinate, Xia Xue raised a tranquilizer pistol and aimed it at his neck and fired a shot, and the soldier fell to the ground without saying a word. The effect of this anesthetic lasted for more than four hours, so Xia Xue ignored him.

A few angels came up and tied up the guy and threw it aside. Xia Xue quietly pushed open the door, and as soon as Sui Jun raised his head from the bed, he heard a slight sound of "poof", and he tilted his head and lay on the bed again.

The rest of the Sui army was still sleeping soundly, Xia Xue retreated, gestured into the house, and more than a hundred angel troops pounced on it like wolves.

At this time, the battle of the whole city had begun, but the battle ended very quickly, and the sleepy-eyed defenders of the Sui army could not have imagined that there were so many people in the dense fog on the opposite side, where they could not see people clearly. The steep straight city wall more than five zhang high is difficult to climb even in daylight with a good view, let alone in the vast dense fog where nothing can be seen clearly. I don't know how they came up, and I don't know why they didn't make a sound at all.

So the Yong'an Cangsui army, which was full of surprise and confusion, except for a few who resisted stubbornly and were killed, most of them obediently raised their hands and surrendered.

After the war, Xia Xue was pleasantly surprised to find that there were 500,000 stone of grain stored in this Yong'an warehouse, as well as a large number of military supplies, weapons and armor.

It was also very gratifying to count the casualties, only more than 20 people were slightly wounded by the Angel Army, and the rest were safe and sound. More than 100 Sui troops were killed, and the remaining 900 were all captured.