The locust plague in the second year of Longdao brought huge losses to all areas north of the Yellow River on the East Asian continent.

Starting from the party in the northwest, the grain output of the entire Great Xia Kingdom this year was directly halved compared with last year, but the war between many Buddha countries in the Western Regions and Pars continued, and the lord of the Xia Kingdom had to continue to maintain a mobile force of tens of thousands of people in the Western Regions in order to maintain his suzerainty over the Buddha countries in the Western Regions.

In the fierce war, food is extremely important, and even in the event of a catastrophe, the domestic taxes in Xia still have not been reduced, and there is even a tendency to increase.

A little further north, the situation in the Mughal steppe was even worse.

Due to its proximity to the place where the locust plague was the greatest, the land where the Shanxi and Han armies who had taken refuge in the Mughal people, as well as the little millet that the Mughurs themselves had sown on the grassland, were almost wiped out.

All kinds of pasture grass on the grassland were also gnawed bare by locusts, which caused the death of a large number of cattle, sheep and livestock.

In Liaodong, the Jurchens, who have become more and more declining in recent years, have also suffered heavy losses, and before the autumn harvest, the price of grain in Liaodong reached 8 guan and one stone.

After the autumn harvest, the new grain was put into storage, which should have fallen somewhat, but because of the locust plague, no matter how stupid people are, they know that this year's harvest cannot support next year's consumption, so the price of grain in Liaodong is not falling but rising, and it is getting faster and faster, rising to as high as 15 guan one stone before the end of the year!

Even the newly opened Jianghuai region of the Great Zhou Dynasty also suffered heavy losses, and these areas, which were equivalent to the newly opened territory, were almost wiped out this year, and the only good thing was that the locust plague did not affect Jiangnan, and the Jianghuai army could still count on support from the mainland.

In the entire north of the Yangtze River, only Qi Province withstood the invasion of locusts, and the more than two-month-long locust extermination war put the entire Qi Province in an almost fanatical atmosphere.

Defeating seemingly invincible natural disasters has made the most ordinary people have the pride of fighting heaven and earth.

All are convinced that they are invincible, and they are indeed invincible.

……

Wang Qinian has traveled back and forth between Qi Province and the grassland many times.

Now he had almost become an agent of trade between the Governor of Qi Province and the Mughul Gulhan Zamuhe.

He now usually transports the sheepskins and horses of the Mughal people to Qi Province once every three months, and then transports the salt of Qi Province to the grasslands.

In this process, Wang Qinian accumulated a lot of wealth, which also made the strength of the horse thief begin to expand rapidly.

The current horse thieves, in addition to the original dozens of old brothers, the total strength has exceeded 300 people, half of which are Mughult horse thieves who can't survive and take refuge, and the rest are mainly Han people, and there are also some Dang Xiang, Jurchen and Sauron (that is, the so-called raw Jurchen, fish skin tartars).

Three hundred riders, it doesn't sound like a lot, but all of them are elite.

Not to mention one person and three horses, riding lunges, bows, sabers, horses, leather armor and iron armor have become common equipment.

If Wang Qinian had a heart, with these three hundred elites, he could quickly pull up a vassal force of tens of thousands of people.

It's just that Wang Qinian doesn't want to do this, he has always maintained a crack army policy - because he doesn't want to be dragged down by a large number of cannon fodder, and horse thieves have always been known for their mobility.

Wang Qinian believes that teams with higher mobility will have relatively more choices.

Today, Wang Qinian came to Quancheng again, this time he brought 600 horses to this side in one go, if he can smoothly transport the salt to the grassland, this time and again, the horse thief himself can earn a profit equivalent to 100 horses.

Of course, in addition to the salt and horse trade, if another task can be completed, Wang Qinian can obtain greater profits.

"The big boss means ......"

The old man Hu Lanshan, who was in charge of receiving Wang Qinian, asked suspiciously:

"The Great Khan of the Mughal Tartars wants to form an alliance with our Governors?"

"Yes." Wang Qinian said: "Please ask Uncle Hu to report to the Metropolitan Governor at this time." ”

For a long time, the person in charge of receiving Wang Qinian has been Hu Lanshan, who has been transferred to the household department, this old man has a bit of a delicate personality, and his business is not bad, but he can't decide such a big issue - whether it is ability or position.

"Before this visit, the Mughal Gulhan wanted the support of the Grand Duke, and he is now preparing for a decisive battle with the Modong Mugul."

Wang Qinian explained a little more:

"His income is very poor this year, and the pressure on him from the Jurchen Tartars is not small, if there is no external support, I am afraid his situation will not be too good."

"I can't call the shots." Old man Hu had no choice but to say, "I can help the big shopkeeper report this matter to the Grand Duke." ”

"So, thank you, old man."

"It should." Old man Hu waited for a while, and suddenly asked again: "What do you think, big boss?" Do you think we should ally ourselves with the Mughal Tatars? ”

Wang Qinian thought for a while and replied seriously: "No." ”

……

The extermination of locusts is no less intense than a war, but it is not a real war after all.

After months of training and the cooperation of the locust eradication operation, all the soldiers had a certain furious mood hidden in their hearts, and they were eager to inflict this fury on the enemy.

Xu Shiyang naturally understood this, so he felt that he should take this opportunity to find a suitable target and show this kind of rage.

Unfortunately, the target is not easy to find.

At present, what Xu Shiyang wants to fight most is, of course, the Jurchen Tartars.

Unfortunately, there is still no sign of recovery in Gaizhou (and even more desolate after the rebellion of the Tartars), and there is no point in attacking this place.

Therefore, the only place that can be fought in Liaodong now is Yaozhou near the mouth of the Sancha River.

However, the Tartars are not fools either, and with only such a goal, it is impossible for them not to be prepared for it.

In the absence of strong cavalry, a head-on battle with the main Tartar force is inevitably a little too eager.

Another target is Goryeo, which has not caused much damage to the Central Plains before.

Goryeo's coastline is very long, there are countless targets to attack, and although Goryeo has a naval division, its combat effectiveness is not strong, and it is a little powerless to deal with the Japanese invaders, and the navy of Qi Province is naturally even more lacking in resistance.

The Goryeo army was also very weak, they did not have the powerful cavalry of the Jurchens, nor did they have strong infantry units.

For the Qi Army, this is almost a hand-to-hand target.

However, although there were pirates in Goryeo, their government did not do anything evil to the Central Plains after all, and morally speaking, they took the initiative to attack Goryeo, and Qi Province itself became an aggressor.

In addition, when the war with the Tartars is not over, it seems inappropriate to take the initiative to find a new enemy.

Xu Shiyang vacillated a little between the two goals, and according to his thoughts, of course, the easiest target should be chosen as much as possible to fight a war.

But he didn't want to bear the infamy of the invader, after all, don't do to others what you don't want to do to others, resist the invader by yourself, resist to the end, and become the invader, Xu Shiyang can't turn this corner in his heart.

。 The fastest update URL for the mobile version: