Perhaps the temptation to regain military power was not resisted, or perhaps the voice of the Jiangdong family clan group was too strong, or the Tangyi army, whose strength had expanded rapidly, was really fearful.

Even though Han Daoming strongly opposes it, he is alone in the DPRK.

In late October, Zhou Yuan and Zhang Qian, the servants of the Ministry of Works, Wu Fan, the Hunan envoy, Zhang Han, the salt and iron transport envoy, Zheng Yu, the envoy of the Du Branch, Zhou Bingwu, the deputy envoy of the privy council, and Du Chongtao, the secretary of the Ministry of War, wrote letters to support his proposal.

By the end of October, the political hall officially requested that the left and right guards and the left and right guards and the left Shenwu army, the right military guard army, and the right dragon military army each transfer one elite to form the left Wu Xiang army under the command of the guard horse infantry pro-army division, and appointed Huang Xi, Li Xiu, and Zhang Feng (Zhang Feng's son) as the chief and deputy commanders, and led the troops to Junzhou to prepare for the attack on Wuguan.

At the same time, the left and right guards were also changed to the left and right Wuyi armies under the command of the Guards Horse Infantry and Pro-Army Division, and continued to be responsible for the defense of the garrison in Gyeonggi, and the shortage of troops was requisitioned from the military government of Zhucang.

In addition to the soldiers and horses drawn from the left and right Wuwei armies from Yiyang and Jingxiang, the Sandu soldiers and horses drawn from the left and right Wuyi armies and the Right Longwu Army also rushed to take the naval warships of the Right Longwu Army to sail along the west from Jinling in early November, and the speed of action was amazingly fast.

A light snow drifted from the sky, and Han Qian led his horse to stop on the river beach, frowning and looking at the warship sailing westward.

The newly formed Zuo Wuxiang army attacked Guanzhong from Wuguan Road, and the ministers of the court almost unanimously passed, and the Zheng family, who had not yet come out of the honeymoon period during this period of time and Tangyi, also specially sent people to Donghu to greet them.

After all, Zheng Hui's use of troops against the remnants of the Yongzhou rebels, as well as the subsequent invasion of Lingnan, are inseparable from Huanghua's support.

As for Huang Xi's lack of experience in commanding troops, the courtiers did not have too many worries.

In addition to Li Xiu and Zhang Feng, two rising stars, who served as deputy commanders, and each leader and one elite striker, Zuo Wuxiang's army also served as a partial division this time, mainly attacking Wuguan and the Shangluo area behind it, and did not consider attacking the hinterland of Guanzhong for the time being.

That is to say, in this operation, the main purpose of the Chu army was only to contain a part of the Liang army from the side, so that the Shu army and the Mengwu people could inflict heavy damage on the main force of the Liang army, so as to prepare for the subsequent use of troops by the Great Chu soldiers and horses from Nanyang or along the Huai River to the north.

That is, he secretly reached an agreement with Shu to occupy Guanzhong and the Chu army to occupy the Central Plains in the future.

In this case, Han Qian had no way to stop anything, and this went to Junzhou, through the Yangtze River and into the Han River, the new sailing ships were extremely fast, and the newly formed Zuo Wuxiang army could complete the assembly of Xichuan, Jingzikou and other military fortresses in almost ten days.

Unless heavy snow can fall at the southern foot of the Qinling Mountains this winter and cover the dangerous road, otherwise Zuo Wuxiang's army will almost be able to complete the preparations for attacking Wuguan by the end of November.

Even so, Han Qian could be regarded as having successfully delayed the time for the Chushu coalition to attack Guanzhong for nearly two months, dragging it into a winter that was unfavorable to the attacker, and this was all he could do for the time being.

When the naval fleet of the Right Dragon Wu Army passed, Han Donghu, who was looking at the movement on the other side with a bronze viewing glass, said, "My lord, Feng Yi's ship has anchored. ”

Feng Yi and Guo were ordered to rush to Yuzhou to meet Changxiang Hou Wang Yong, and only today did they secretly accompany Yuzhou Sima Cao Gan to return to East Lake.

Unfortunately, it happened that they were almost as fast as they reached the mouth of the Yuxi River, and the naval fleet of the Right Dragon Wu Army passed through the Yangtze River. Even the ships of the Chishan Society could not casually ram the reorganized naval fleet of the Right Dragon Martial Army for no reason, so they could only dock patiently to the south bank and wait.

Han Qian happened to be in Dongguan Town with Wang Jun today, and when he heard the news, he went to the river beach to greet Cao Gan, and by the way, he also took a look at the military appearance of the newly formed Zuo Wuxiang army.

After the naval fleet passed, Feng Yi, Guo Ke, and Cao Gan quickly came by boat, and they directly borrowed the temporary trestle bridge at the mouth of the river to go ashore and meet Han Qian and Wang Jun.

Han Qian saw that Cao Gan's thin chin was covered with dense stubble, and there were a few white beards, and then he thought that Cao Gan was almost sixty years old, frowned slightly, and bowed his hand: "It's been a few years since I said goodbye, is Lord Cao okay?" ”

"I'm tired of Hou Ye, everything can be considered okay, but in short, it's far from being as good as Hou Ye." Cao Gan saw that Han Qian's attitude was quite reluctant, and said with a salute.

The number of times Cao Gan and Han Qian met was extremely limited, but the last time he had direct contact with Han Qian's close relatives, Xuzhou secretly asked Yuzhou to cooperate with the troops, so that Xuzhou could hide under the water, and also forced Sizhou and Hunan Xuanfu to recruit the rebels in Tianpingdu.

In that cooperation, the balance of Xuzhou's covert support completely controlled the Wuchuan River Valley, and they also successfully cleared the power of the prince Wang Hongyi from the Zuoqingjiang army and Yuzhou, and then the border trade between the two families through the Qianjiang waterway was relatively stable at about one million yuan per year in the past two years.

In the past two years, Yuzhou has been able to make a profit of 300,000 or 400,000 yuan from the border trade of the Qianjiang River every year.

This is mainly due to the millions of horses of Qianyang cloth imported every year, which bring too much profit to Yuzhou.

They not only sold Qianyang cloth in the Sichuan and Shu regions through the warehouses they secretly controlled, but also transported them to the Xibo region together with tea, medicine, ironware and other goods, and traded horses, furs and other goods back - there were even thousands of fine Xifan war horses and other three or four thousand camel horses every year, which were transferred to Xuzhou through their hands.

Xifan war horses, they can make more money if they have more hands.

The Marquis of Changxiang not only controlled the income of Yukui Kip and other states, but also through such a huge amount of border trade income, he used the rebellion of Banan and southern Sichuan to expand the soldiers and horses of the Zuoqingjiang army to nearly 30,000 people, and was faintly able to compete with the power of the prince Wang Hongyi in Shu.

It's just that all this is really small compared to the expansion of Xuzhou or Tangyi Army in the past four or five years.

Even in the border trade of the Qianjiang waterway, it seems that Xuzhou's annual profit is slightly lower than that of Yuzhou, but Yuzhou is not blind and will not simply look at the numbers on the surface account.

In recent years, the well salt purchased by the Wuchuan County Salt and Iron Supervision Institute from Yuzhou has been lower than one year a year, but it has been exported to central Guizhou through the Ruanjiang waterway and the Qianjiang waterway for export

Salt is more than a year after a year - and the salt imported into Xuzhou by the Dachu Salt and Iron Transshipment Department is well documented, and it is only a little more than 20,000 stone a year.

This shows that the area controlled by Xuzhou has been able to produce well salt on a large scale, apparently in the mountains near the Wuchuan River Valley.

Even if it is 20,000 stones of salt transferred from the Huaidong salt field, Xuzhou still has to eat more than 20,000 taels of salt from it, that is, the salt and iron transfer envoy will give these salts to the Xuzhou Yafu at a salt price of two taels per stone, and the Xuzhou Yafu will increase the price of one taper stone and resell it to several designated salt merchants for private sales.

This has the privilege of selling the prefectures and feudal towns with independent economic rights.

Xuzhou only raised the price of salt by one taper stone, which was already considered very conscientious, and at the same time, salt merchants were prohibited from selling salt to the private sector at a price higher than four tassels per stone, beyond which the state government would directly supply the private sector with open quantities.

In addition to Xuzhou, with the expansion of the control area of Tangyi Prefecture, the annual salt transferred from the Huaidong Salt Field has also surged from the initial 20,000 stone to 100,000 stone this year.

The price of this part of the salt is 1,500 yuan per stone, and the Chishan Society will directly carry it from the salt factory, with an additional price of 1,000 yuan, and deliver it to the salt merchants in the counties for distribution, but at the same time, it is required that the retail price of salt for the people shall not be higher than 30 yuan per catty; If this price is exceeded, the government will directly open up the amount to the private sector.

That is to say, it is only the 120,000 stone of salt that Huaixi and Xuzhou normally take over from the Huaidong Salt Farm every year, and Han Qian wants to directly take away the 120,000 yuan of salt profits, but in addition, Cao Gan can determine that the annual well salt produced in Wuchuan has actually exceeded 100,000 stones, and even as much as 150,000.

This is mainly due to the fact that the scale of well salt exported to the central Guizhou region is too difficult to calculate, and only an approximate number can be estimated.

These well salts do not have the salt and iron transshipment division to participate in the distribution of profits, and each stone well salt is net profit after deducting production and transportation costs, and Cao Gan expects Han Qian to grab up to 400,000 yuan of net income every year.

In other words, Han Qian controlled the Wuchuan River Valley through the Sizhou civil rebellion, and then mastered the border trade in the middle and upper reaches of the Qianjiang River, and could get a net income of almost 700,000 yuan a year, which was almost more than double the income of Yuzhou.

It's a bit frustrating to think about it.

And coupled with the strong support of Han Qiao and others, it is no wonder that Han Qian was able to expand such a scale of elite combat power in Huaixi.

It was not early, and it was not suitable to sit down and talk in the wilderness, Han Qian led someone to bring horses to Cao Gan and his entourage, and everyone rushed to Dongguan Town surrounded by more than 100 guards.

Han Qian originally planned to build a remote embankment along the river, at that time it was considered that the breakthrough to the north was not effective, Tangyi would be suppressed on the south bank of the Chu River development, and it was inevitable to build a remote embankment to reclaim the river beach area, but the follow-up war was extremely smooth, and now most of the Huaixi area has been pocketed, there is no need to worry about arable land, but worry about the vast land and sparse population, so the huge cost of building a long embankment along the river is temporarily shelved.

Landing from the mouth of the Yuxi River, Cao Gan saw that the river beach was still barren, but when he arrived at Dongguan Town, he saw the fields on both sides of the Yuxi River, and the large newly built villages were not simply built to live in the shacks, and there were a lot of brick and tile houses in the middle of the earthen walls and grass houses, and there was a prosperous scene of the land of fish and rice.

All this shows that in the three or four years since the Tangyi army recovered the east bank of Chaohu Lake, the local people's livelihood has recovered to a considerable level.

Those who are good at governance know the importance of recuperating with the people, but as far as traditional experience is concerned, even if a region that has been severely devastated by war and repeatedly devastated is reinstated, it will take at least 10 years to recuperate and recuperate if it wants to restore the level of agriculture before the war.

There has been no large-scale war in Shu for about 256 years, and the population has only increased by about 40% compared with the founding of the country, but the vast majority of households are still struggling on the line of abject poverty after paying taxes, and it is far from being comparable with the rich land of fish and rice during the former dynasty and the middle of the country.

Seeing this, Cao Gan can also understand why the Great Chu courtiers reached an agreement in such a short period of time after the Zuo Shenwu Army of Chai Jian's department was restrained and could not attack Wuguan, and decided to form a new Zuo Wuxiang army, and Huang Xi, the son of Huang Hua, led the western attack to fight Wuguan.

In other words, who is not afraid of such an unruly tiger lying around him, and his physique is passing day by day?

After arriving in Dongguan Town, Han Qian arranged for Cao Gan and his entourage to live in a courtyard for a short rest, and he first called Feng Yi and Guo Qi to ask them about their trip.

Dongguan Town has poor conditions, and only a township inspection department has been set up to patrol and supervise the river entering the Xuweikou.

More than 100 guards and cavalry were stationed, and the yamen was packed, and everyone sat in a small hall and talked.

In addition to Han Qian, Wang Jun, Han Donghu, Huo Li, Wang Zhe and other attendants, Feng Yi also rushed back from Liyang temporarily.

At this time, he wanted to know what new information Guo Ke and Feng Yi could bring with Cao Gan this time.

"When we arrived in Yuzhou, we didn't see Wang Yong, the Marquis of Changxiang, at first, even Cao Gan's face, everything was Cao Gan's son Cao Zhe who came forward to deal with us, and it wasn't until late last month that Wang Yong finally summoned us, but he didn't say anything. Two days later, when we were planning to return to East Lake, Wang Yong suddenly decided to ask Cao Gan to accompany us back."

Guo Ke and Feng Yi went to Yuzhou, but the information they could directly obtain was limited, and Cao Zhe took different officials to eat and drink with them every day, which actually restricted their freedom of movement.

As far as the current situation is known, the Shu army attacked Guanzhong from Liangzhou, mainly led by the Shu prince Wang Hongyi, the son of Shu Wang Hongyi, the son of Shu Wang Hongyi served as the privy envoy, and stayed in Shu to preside over the entire troop plan, the commander is Zhao Mengji, the younger brother of Zhao Weisheng in the service, who served as the Liangzhou assassin and the general of Zhenbei after the Jinling Incident, and the deputy marshal is the Wei Marquis and Wang Hongyi's younger brother Wang Xiaoxian, who led the elite of the Shu army of 20,000 forbidden troops to support the northern line, and mobilized a total of 60,000 Shu troops and tens of thousands of people, and attacked Guanzhong from the Meridian Road, Baochuan Road, and Luogu Road.

The attitude of the Yuzhou generals such as Changxiang Hou Wang Yong and Cao Gan towards the Shu army's alliance with Chu's Northern Expedition was still vague in Guo's eyes - this was a bit strange, and they were not as active as Han Qian had predicted earlier, but they did not clearly express their opposition, and Yuzhou also shared the grain needed to send the troops, and did not shirk it.

Guo reported to the end and said,

"We accompanied Cao Gan to Tangyi, and on the way learned about the new Zuo Wuxiang army attacking Guanzhong, seeing that Cao Gan was not particularly surprised, we suspect that Cao Gan should know that the Wen clan has entered

Tangyi ......"

Even on the way, Guo Ke and Feng Yi kept secret correspondence with Donghu, knowing that Han Donghu and others, with the assistance of Shen Peng, had successfully robbed the Wen clan to Liyang City and put them under house arrest.

Even if the Wen clan is secretly placed under house arrest in Liyang City, they will not openly admit this to the outside world for the time being, but in order to ensure that Lu Qingxia and the others do not dare to use troops against Guanzhong easily, they will also ensure that some rumors can reach the ears of Lu Qingxia and the others.

On the way, Feng Yi and Guo learned that the main force of the Zuo Shenwu Army of Chai Jian's department had been transferred to the front line of the Fangcheng defense line in the north of Nanyang, and the vacated Junzhou was garrisoned by the Zuo Wuxiang Army, which was newly assigned to the Guards Horse Infantry and the Pro-Army Division, and was responsible for the attack on Wuguan.

However, Cao Gan knew about this, but he didn't show too much surprise and surprise, which is worth pondering.

Han Qian had speculated that Xiao Yiqing or Wang Jingrong had secretly sent someone to Shu Chu to contact the old subordinate forces of the Shenling Division, which was undoubtedly further verified from the side.

At the beginning, although Guo Ke and Feng Yi had only briefly contacted Changxiang Hou Wang Yong once, and accompanied Cao Gan back to East Lake along the way, the information they could find out from Cao Gan was quite limited, but after staying in Yuzhou for more than ten days and contacting the generals in Yuzhou, they could still clearly grasp two more critical information.

The first point is that although Wang Jian, the lord of Shu, knew that Taoguang was obscure in his early years, and even did not hesitate to call himself a vassal to the Liang State so that Shu could recuperate, but in recent years, Wang Jian, the lord of Shu, has gradually had the intention of becoming the emperor.

This is very likely to be the main reason why the Shu army decided to seek victory in Guanzhong and Yuzhou at this time, and there was no strong opposition, rather than the result of simple lobbying and demagoguery.

Wang Jianji, the lord of Shu, probably wanted to take advantage of the situation to become emperor when he established the merit of annexing Guanzhong and his prestige was on a higher level.

Another point is that although Yuzhou has gained huge benefits in cooperation with Xuzhou in recent years, and its strength has grown a lot, due to the silence of Wang Jian, the lord of Shu, the Marquis of Changxiang did not see any possibility of winning in the matter of competing for succession.

At this time, the Yuzhou generals also knew that Xuzhou had greater benefits from the border trade between the two parties, especially the fact that Wuchuan could produce well salt on a large scale, and it was impossible to keep the secret at this time, and the county lord of Qingyang did not receive substantial support from Tangyi in Dachu, so the Yuzhou generals were more or less dissatisfied and resentful.

"If you are close, you are not inferior, and if you are far away, you will be resentful, they have obtained such a great benefit for nothing, but there are still complaints, in the end, the temperament of the general of Yuzhou or the Marquis of Changxiang Wang Yong is limited after all, and we can't expect us to single-handedly put him on the throne of the monarch of Shu, right?" Feng Yi said with emotion, "When Guo Ke and Feng Yi arrived in Yuzhou, they could only see Wang Yong in a hurry, Wang Yong may have a lot of resentment in his heart, probably because he feels that he is being used more by us, right?" ”

Han Qian hugged one hand to his chest, supported it with the other, frowned and asked Guo Ke: "Wang Yong only hurriedly saw Guo Ke and them after wasting more than ten days, why did he ask Cao Gan to secretly come to East Lake to see me, did there any change in attitude?" ”

"What if Wang Yong moved his mind to usurp the throne?" Wang Jun had been sitting beside Han Qian and listening quietly to Guo Qi's report, and then interjected and asked.

Hearing Wang Jun say this, Feng Yi was startled and seemed to be split through the fog by a bolt of lightning, and subconsciously said: "The Liang State is in turmoil, and the soldiers and horses of the towns of Great Chu are suspicious of each other and contain each other, at this time, the main force of the Shu army, especially the people and horses of Wang Hongyi, the prince of Shu, are attacking Guanzhong from Liangzhou, which is a good opportunity for Wang Yong to plot to usurp the throne!" ”

Hearing Wang Jun and Feng Yi talk about this possibility, Guo Ke, Feng Yi, Han Donghu, Wang Zhe and other attendants and generals were shocked for a while.

After Han Qian sat back on the long case made by Yumu, he was silent for a long time, he was only a little worried before, but now the intelligence information brought back by Guo Ke and Feng Yi is really not optimistic.

If it weren't for being forced to have no way out, no one would act rashly when a strong enemy was waiting outside.

However, the surrounding strong enemies are in chaos and have no time to take care of themselves, this is not only a good opportunity to send troops to attack the strong enemy and take advantage of the fire to rob, but also an opportunity to launch an internal mutiny, which will not be taken advantage of by foreign enemies, and there is no need to worry about making a wedding dress for foreign enemies.

Just like after the victory of Wujinling, Huaidong sent troops to seize Shiliang, and Han Qian didn't say a word, at that time, the Shouzhou army still maintained a fairly strong combat power, and any dispute between Tangyi and Huaidong would only make the Shouzhou army fishermen profitable.

However, when the Liang State was in turmoil, the Shouzhou Army was forced to retreat to protect itself, and it was difficult to threaten Tangyi from the northern front, Han Qian also unceremoniously took the opportunity to recover Shiliang County from Huaidong.

And Han Qian's secret robbery of the Wen clan from Xuzhou can make Lu Qingxia and others dare not act rashly, and the reason is the same; In the absence of the threat of the Shouzhou army from the northern front, they couldn't guess what his side would do.

In the attack on Guanzhong by the Shu-Chu coalition army, the reason why Changxiang Marquis Wang Yong has been silent may be here; Feng Yi and Guo were in contact with the generals in Yuzhou, and they could hear some complaints, but they could not say that the Marquis of Changxiang Wang Yong was not secretive enough, and sometimes connived at subordinates to breed dissatisfaction and resentment, which was also an effective means to maintain internal cohesion or mobilize for trouble.

And Wang Yong had a cold attitude towards Feng Yi and Guo Ke before, and then suddenly asked Cao Gan to accompany Guo Ke and Feng Yi to secretly rush to East Lake, perhaps after learning the news of their abduction of the Wen clan from the secret envoy of Guanjianglou, he mistakenly thought that they had the ambition and greed to take advantage of the chaos, so they wanted to achieve each other, right?

What a mess!

"Jun'er, let's go back to Liyang!" Han Qian stood up exhausted and said to Wang Jun.

"You don't see Cao Gan anymore?" Feng Yi asked in surprise.

"It's gone, you stay to deal with Cao Gan, and just make an excuse to say that I have something urgent to rush back to Liyang." Han Qian said impatiently.

"......" Feng Yi wanted to ask something more, but seeing Han Qian's somewhat irritated look, he thought that he would better get more accurate information from Cao Gan's mouth before anything else.

Staying Guo accompanied Feng Yi to deal with Cao Gan - after all, the follow-up Chishan Meeting, the liaison with Yuzhou, and the intelligence collection and espionage in Shu were all under Guo Qi's responsibility, and Feng Yi was also fine, and followed Han Qian and them back to East Lake first.

For more than a month, he has either been holding back on the boat, or eating idle meals in Yuzhou, and he is also very disgusted in his heart.

Speechless all the way, bypassing the newly repaired post road at the southern foot of Suwei Mountain, it was already late at night when I rushed back to Liyang City.