It is said that the emperor is the Son of Heaven and sits on the world, but in the feudal era, the imperial power was actually not able to control the grassroots below the county level (the tax collector system of Mengyuan was difficult even in the lower provinces).

In other words, the only effective means of management for the emperor or a feudal regime over units below the county level was to clear the acres of land.

As long as it can sort out the number of people under its rule, how many young and middle-aged men are among them, how many fields there are, and what the production of the fields is, the imperial court will be able to determine the amount of taxes to be levied and the number of people to be recruited for military service and labor every year based on this data.

Therefore, no matter which dynasty or generation, if the court has spare strength, it will definitely find ways to clear the acres.

If it can succeed, it usually means that the centralized feudal court is gradually becoming stronger, and it also means that a new "rule of XX" is coming.

Of course, where there are successes, there are more unsuccessful.

Clearing the acres is not a trivial matter at any time, whether there are so many people who are well-versed in books to do this, not to mention in advance, just those places where the interests are strong, it is not so easy to deal with!

During the period of rough security, the large landlords would carry out soft confrontation against the Qing Dynasty by bribing officials, sending land to the land, and concealing the land and mu, in order to reduce the amount of taxes for their own families.

In this kind of war and chaos now...... the owners of the dock fort who regard the Dingkou field as their lifeblood, I am afraid that they will have to resist with arms!

After Soldier A appeared and took away a dock castle owner, the atmosphere at the meeting became cold.

The new Dock Castle owners no longer quarrel or talk to each other.

One by one, they sat quietly in their seats, bowing their heads and drinking tea.

The atmosphere of the scene became eerie.

Xu Muhe, who used to be the magistrate of the Great Zhou, knew very well that their current expression did not mean that they had promised to clear the fields and acres - although they were forced to express their stance now, they would most likely agree verbally.

But these dock owners won't cooperate, absolutely not.

Maybe turn around and go home, and these people will open a new meeting, form a new alliance, and arm against him, the Qingzhou Festival Envoy!

However, in troubled times, the strong man is the king.

Xu Muhe's eyes narrowed dangerously as he looked at the field.

If these people are really armed to fight, with Xu Shiyang's victorious new army, this is a very good opportunity!

Xu Shiyang has already told him, and next, the most important task of the Xu family is on the other side of the canal.

There's a chance there's going to be a real big battle over there.

If he wins, the Xu family will soar.

But if they lose, the Xu family will probably suffer a catastrophe.

Xu Muhe has already made up his mind to gamble on this game, so he intends to mobilize all the forces at his disposal (even if it is by coercive means) as much as possible to strive for this victory!

He believes that if the internal destabilizing factors can be eliminated at an early stage, there will also be great support for concentrating forces on a decisive battle.

"Since ancient times, no one has heard that it is possible not to pay the imperial grain and national tax, and clearing the fields and acres is just a return to the origin, and everyone here is also regarded as the dry city of the country, so I guess I won't disagree, right?"

Xu Muhe cleared his throat and announced loudly:

"After everyone goes back this time, within three months, they will first declare their own land, grade, population, Dingkou, etc., and pay taxes and grain according to the amount they declare this year."

"At the beginning of next year, the official will send someone to check whether the amount declared by each family is accurate, and at that time, the official start of clearing the acres of land!"

In the following time, others stopped talking, and the meeting became Xu Muhe's personal command press conference:

First of all, at the beginning of next month, each dock fort sent Dingkou to Qingzhou Mansion to serve as a laborer according to the standard of 50 people per fort.

This was Xu Muhe's means to further weaken the local tyrants - the dock fort, which was usually only a few hundred dingkou, suddenly lost 50 strong laborers, and even if there was armed resistance, the combat effectiveness would be much weakened.

In addition, it is not a secret how many dock forts there are in the Qingzhou Mansion, and they probably don't dare not send a few people without completely tearing their faces for the time being.

What's more, putting the time at the beginning of next month was originally to wait until after the interception and pro-ship fleet.

At that time, in the process of interception, the new army of the Xu family showed its strength to surpass the official forbidden army, and the Tartars had not yet come, and the possibility of local heroes rushing to carry out armed resistance would be greatly reduced.

As for the autumn harvest next month, sending so many strong men out will affect the autumn harvest.

Xu Shiyang gave a solution to this problem.

That is, after the battle, organize the recruits and the Ding Zhuang from each family, if it is not enough, the soldiers of the new army can also participate, and everyone forms a harvest team, one by one to help each family harvest.

There is no need to collect wages from each family, but it is better to pay them for their work (if you don't obey orders, you will not get this reward).

This sounds like a good idea, but it has to wait for the interception operation to be carried out smoothly, because Xu Muhe wants to regard this snatching team as a "benevolent government" to win people's hearts, and he doesn't want the dock castle owners to take this kind of initiative to show favor for granted.

……

On the 10th of July, the high-level transfer of the new army was completed, and the new establishment was established.

There are still 500 men per infantry battalion, of which 100 are selected forwards, 150 are sharp soldiers and 150 are riflemen, and 50 are gunners—according to the establishment, there should be 1 general cannon and 2 artillery guns, as well as grooms and artillery commanders.

The remaining 50 people are the escorts of officers and battalion commanders (most of them are still selected close combatmen), signal soldiers on horseback, pacification soldiers, drummers, etc.

As the name suggests, the high proportion of recruits with a service period of less than one year is tearful, but Xu Shiyang has no time, he must launch an attack as soon as possible, cross most of Yanzhou before entering Qi Province with his own fleet, and capture the famous Zhujiazhuang along the canal.

According to the information provided by Jiang Nan, there should be about twenty days left for the pro-ship fleet to enter Qi Province, so Xu Shiyang should set off now.

The troops participating in the interception include a total of 4,500 troops from 9 battalions and 300 traps of the new army, 1,000 new battalions with only a dozen days of service, and 3,000 militiamen from Juzhou and Rizhao counties will participate in the battle as auxiliary troops.

The first batch of 8,500 participants, this is the highest mobilization capacity of the two counties of Juzhou and Rizhao, although it is not the limit, but after all, it is still busy farming, and it is also necessary to prevent the main rebellion of the outer dock fort, and some people must be left at home as a defensive force.

The second wave of reinforcements that Xu Muhe promised to Xu Shiyang could only come from the newly joined Wubao and the newly controlled territories in the north of Qingzhou.

He planned to use the temptation of preferential conscription to recruit 5,000 militia in the newly controlled territory after the autumn harvest, plus the militia forcibly recruited from the newly joined Wubao lord within the alliance, as a second wave of reinforcements to Xu Shiyang.

On 12 July, the first batch of sorties was prepared, and while the Qingzhou Alliance meeting was still going on, the new army set off.

The interception operation officially began.