Contrary to the situation of other Zhulu rebels, the Xingtian Army entrenched in the area of western Henan is like staying out of the matter, there are not many officers and soldiers to find their trouble, the existing surrounding officers and soldiers, are afraid of the fierceness of the Xingtian Army, just around to monitor the movement of the Xingtian Army, before Xiong Wencan did not send a large army to come, they did not dare to move, and the Xingtian Army also took the initiative to stop the army again after April, and entered the dormant period after entering Henan.

But this does not mean that Xiao Tianjian can take the opportunity to take a breath, in early April, after Xiong Wencan's first defeat in the Xingtian Army, Xiao Tianjian also suspended continuing to expand his territory in western Henan, focusing on the beginning of digesting the territory of these counties that have been in hand.

After the beginning of spring, nearly 200,000 displaced people poured into several counties in the area controlled by the Xingtian Army, which made the labor force in these counties fundamentally solved, and a large number of abandoned farmland was restored in an extreme period of time, and the confiscated private land of the feudal kings and magnates was also distributed, including the official land of the former government.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Xiao Tianjian recruited thousands of strong people among the displaced people who poured into the jurisdiction, stationed in five counties, and launched a large-scale training operation for them, there were already eight war battalions in Henan, plus these newly recruited recruits, the strength was close to the scale of 15,000 people, if it weren't for the food problem, Xiao Tianjian could easily recruit tens of thousands of soldiers and horses in these five counties, but if Xiao Tianjian did this, Then the Xingtian Army is estimated to be almost the same as the other rebels.

Niu Jinxing at this time, but also really showed his talent, the military just calmed down, Niu Jinxing took over the civil affairs, he new Xiao Tianjian, bent on Xiao Tianjian to make some achievements, for this he learned in detail about the previous policy of the Xingtianjun in Shanxi, put forward some amendments to some of them, submitted to Xiao Tianjian, Xiao Tianjian after review, felt that many of the opinions put forward by Niu Jinxing are still quite practical, So even if the things mentioned by Niu Venus were approved.

And Niu Jinxing, as a famous scholar in Henan, recruited a lot of students and classmates, and devoted himself to Xiao Tianjian's work, which greatly alleviated Xiao Tianjian's lack of management talents in civil affairs, and the implementation of civil affairs in several counties was much faster than Xiao Tianjian imagined. Although the land they planted cannot be returned to their names for the time being, but in this troubled world, they can find a place to live in peace, there is land to plant, there is food, for these displaced people there is no more luxury, so in a short period of time, the agricultural production in the jurisdiction of the Xingtian Army has been quickly restored, and some of the original wasteland and abandoned farmland have all been planted with grain, plus Chongzhen's ten years of Henan is relatively smooth, and the grain crops in the farmland around the country after the summer are quite good, At least the autumn harvest is not much of a problem if nothing else.

And Niu Jinxing's performance in civil affairs also relieved Xiao Tianjian of a considerable burden, allowing him to spare a considerable amount of time to focus on the work of preparing the army.

Although because of Xiong Wencan's change of thinking, the main target was on other rebel armies, but after all, the Xingtian Army was begging for a living under the eyes of the government, and the surrounding prefectures and counties also increased their forces after April to monitor the movements of the Xingtian Army and prevent the re-expansion of the Xingtian Army, and the soldiers and horses stationed in various places of the Xingtian Army were inevitably engaged in some small-scale battles with the officers and troops surrounding them.

For this kind of petty fight, Xiao Tianjian is happy to see that soldiers can't support the real elite division by training alone, only through continuous battle, soldiers who have seen blood can be regarded as truly qualified soldiers, and can obey the dispatch in the real battlefield, so he is very much in favor of the counties and armies to take the initiative to find trouble with the nearby officers and soldiers, and temper the recruits through the fight with the officers and soldiers.

On the one hand, they went upstream, and their tentacles even extended to the vicinity of Fenglingdu, the most famous on the Yellow River, by attacking the merchant ships of the officials and business tycoons, they continued to obtain the necessary materials, and at the same time traveled downstream to the river in the Kaifeng area, and trafficked all kinds of goods of the Xingtian Army back and forth on the Yellow River in the name of merchant ships.

Of course, the other most important task of the water camp is to escort all kinds of materials to be transferred to Henan, handed over to Xiao Tianjian, and supplied to the Xingtian army in Henan for use, and for such a large-scale transportation, the inspection department on the Yellow River has almost no way, although the official has also organized several interceptions of the Xingtian army fleet, but the detailed work of the intelligence department under Feng Gouzi always found out the news in advance, so that the water camp was prepared in advance, and Yang Kunshan planned to set up an ambush on the river surface, and came down several times. The fleet of ships and officers and soldiers put together by the government did not get cheap, but they were beaten up and defeated repeatedly, and once again, even the people with the boat were captured by Yang Kunshan, so after several times, the government did not dare to intercept the fleet of the Xingtian Army on the river.

In order to ensure that these materials can be smoothly delivered to Xiao Tianjian's hands, Xiao Tianjian arranged a dark pile near the river in Mianchi County after crossing to the south, and was responsible for receiving the goods, and there was no shipment of goods.

The official army garrison garrison in Mianchi did not dare to come forward to intercept at all, and could only watch the Xingtianjun swagger from under their noses to transport goods, and then until June, the county of Mianchi was really angry, and repeatedly reported the matter to Feng Yijun, the prefect of Luoyang, Feng Yijun learned that the Xingtianjun was so arrogant, so he sent someone to Shaanzhou, and informed Cao Wenyao, who was temporarily sitting in Hangu Pass, about it.

Cao Wenyao at the beginning of April, in the official road to eat the deflated of the Xingtian Army, then retreated to Hangu Pass, for this Hong Chengchou personally sent someone to reprimand it, so that Cao Wenyao was angry to death, after April he led the troops three times to re-enter the Lu clan, as a result of this time were beaten by the Xingtian Army to escape back to Hangu Pass, really don't say, Cao Wenyao as a fierce general, can not beat the Xingtian Army, but run up but really didn't say, every time he ran fast, he could escape back to Hangu Pass unscathed, and his luck was quite good.

So after a few times, Cao Wenyao also learned to be obedient, as long as the Xingtian Army did not fight Hangu Pass, he would not be able to retreat, and he would not go to trouble the Xingtian Army, so that the northern part of Lushi County would be stable.

When he heard the news that the Xingtian Army often smuggled supplies from Mianchi County, Cao Wenyao thought that his opportunity to take revenge had finally come, when even if he secretly mobilized two thousand Qin soldiers from Shaanxi, he rushed to Mianchi County day and night, when even the hidden pile set up by the Xingtian Army on the side of the Yellow River was pulled out, the hidden pile used by the Xingtian Army to receive and transfer materials was a village near the river, after Cao Wenyao broke through, Cao Wenyao obtained a lot of ammunition and weapons from the village that the Xingtian Army had just transported from Shanxi, Then he slaughtered more than 300 men, women and children in the village, even the newborn babies were not spared, and finally burned the village.

When the news reached Yongning, Xiao Tianjian was angry and started the case, Cao Wenyao did this, making it clear that he was taking revenge on the repeated defeat of the Xingtian Army, so he immediately personally led Liu Bao and other three battalions of soldiers, gathered two companies of Situ Liang's cavalry battalion, plus a battalion of soldiers and an engineer battalion, and sent troops to Michi.

When Xiao Tianjian led his troops to Mianchi, Cao Wenyao had already led his troops back to Shaanzhou in advance, Xiao Tianjian couldn't catch Cao Wenyao, so he sprinkled his anger on Mianchi County, and even pulled out the Zhuangzi of the three officials outside Mianchi County, and killed the families of the three officials, and sent troops to the city of Mianchi County, and threw more than 100 heads into Mianchi County with a throwing cart.

Frightened, the defenders of Mianchi County and the county magistrate are fart, closed the city gate and did not dare to fight, Xiao Tianjian led his troops outside the city to make a lot of noise, did not attack the city, turned around and marched eastward, with lightning speed, suddenly captured the Xin'anyi east of Mianchi County for the second time, and brought the Xin'anyi under the control of the Xingtian Army.

In this way, Xiao Tianjian is equivalent to cutting off the connection between Mianchi and Luoyang, and Xin'an Yi is also the west gate of Luoyang City, once this place is controlled by the Xingtian Army, the Xingtian Army can appear under Luoyang City in less than a day, for such an action of the Xingtian Army, Luoyang is even more nervous, and hurriedly sent someone to Xiong Wencan for help.

But without waiting for Xiong Wencan to react, after Xiao Tianjian swept Xin'anyi, he took the property and food he had obtained and took the initiative to give up Xin'anyi, and withdrew his troops to Yongning County.

This action of the Xingtian Army is very deterrent to the officials and soldiers in the Luoyang area, even Feng Yijun regrets it a little, he should not let Cao Wenyao be involved in this matter, if Cao Wenyao does not slaughter the hidden pile of the Xingtian Army, the Xingtian Army will not report it so much, Xin'an Yi was almost razed to the ground by the Xingtian Army, and the Dazhuang in Mianchi County was also broken by the Xingtian Army.

With the current force of the Xingtian Army, Mianchi County is actually a piece of meat on their chopping board, as long as Xiao Tianjian is willing, he can take Mianchi County at any time, but because the geographical location of Mianchi County is the same as that of Shaanxi, once the Xingtian Army captures Mianchi, it will inevitably attract the government's all-out attack, and now before the autumn harvest gets sufficient food supply, Xiao Tianjian does not want to become a bird, so although he is angry with Cao Wenyao for doing this, but in the end he only punished Mianchi County, but did not occupy Xin'anyi for a long time, took the initiative to retreat and gave way to this north-south passage that the government attaches great importance to.

However, the retreat does not mean that the Xingtian Army shows weakness, after sweeping Michi County, in order to ensure that the north-south communication will not be cut off by the official army, Xiao Tianjian stationed a battalion of soldiers in the area of Xiangping Mountain from Yongning to Shaanzhou, and set up a camp of the Xingtian Army, which held the mountain pass leading from Shaanzhou to Yongning.

From Xiangping Mountain, if it is a cavalry, it only takes half a day to gallop to the outside of Shaanzhou City, and at the same time standing on Xiangping Mountain, you can monitor the official road from Shaanzhou to Luoyang, and look down on the Yellow River, so that it is equivalent to putting a knife on the neck of Shaanzhou, if Cao Wenyao makes another move, it will soon be discovered by the Xingtian Army, and Shaanzhou can be threatened at any time.

After this demonstration, the officials of Mianchi County no longer dared to provoke the Xingtian Army, and it did not take long for the Xingtian Army to start smuggling in the territory of Mianchi County, and all kinds of materials from the north and south began to flow through Mianchi County in a steady stream and began to recover.