The dark and dead silence of the city of Ganquan was in stark contrast to the brightly lit fortress of the Ice Castle, and all the people in the city were waiting for the excited Qianhu to follow.

Zhang Yuan has also made up his mind, as long as this Qianhu lord who still has a little conscience for soldiers is not demanding, he will definitely do his best to meet it, after all, it is the employment stage, and he can also use these small money to win people's hearts and find some contacts for himself to gain a firm foothold in the officialdom in the future.

A businessman is an eternal pain in his heart.

After Ganquan Qianhu was impassioned, he no longer cared about anything, and spit out the heartfelt words that had been suppressed in his heart for a long time, which completely shocked Zhang Yuan, could it be that Qianhu has really reached such a situation? Don't pretend to be pitiful and take yourself as the wrongdoer.

Seeing Zhang Yuan stunned and looking at himself, the thousand households gave him a deep salute: "I thank Master Zhang, on behalf of all the guards, thank you, it was you who rewarded the brothers with 10,000 taels of silver and 1,000 stone of grain and rice, so that I can wait for Qiu Ba to have hope to pass this year of starvation, so that I will not become hungry." However, the money and food you distributed are according to the existing head, there is no wealth, I don't really leave two thousand taels for myself, I still have a little business to maintain a family drinking a bowl of gruel without dying, my two thousand taels will be divided into one thousand taels to the families of those soldiers who have died, so that they will not sell their sons and daughters for the Chinese New Year this year, and the old father and mother of the dead brother should not go to the wilderness alone to leave a mouthful of food for their children and grandchildren. There are still 1,000 taels, and in the future, without the support of you, Lord Zhang, I will buy some rice and grain and struggle to keep my 800 brothers alive. At this point, the guards of the city and the city were already crying.

"Come, Zhang Laoshi, you tell you what happened to your family." Qianhu brought the soldier forward again, and the soldier was already sobbing, and he barely held back his tears under Qianhe's repeated encouragement, but he was ashamed to answer.

The thousand households had no choice but to shout loudly to Zhang Yuan, the children of the Zhang family behind Zhang Yuan, and to the county who was full of shame; "Zhang Laoshi, who succeeded his father at the age of ten, has been thirty years now, and now his wife can't say which roadside is becoming a half-closed door to pick up customers, doing a leather and meat business." The honest man threw away his spear and squatted on the ground, covering his face with his hands, and crying bitterly.

"His wife may be begging on the side of the road in the county with his only grandson." paused, and then said in a low voice: "His ten-year-old daughter was sold to the original county son a few months ago, and became a child daughter-in-law for his idiot son, this is still my plea, this is still the grace of the county honor, I want a military child who does not weigh thirty pounds, pigs and dogs are not as good, I can't bear her starving to death, but it is only three pockets of wheat, it is worth three bags of wheat, if it were not for the Zhang family to leave a single seedling to continue the incense, his son would have been sold to others." ”

As the thousand households spoke more and more deeply, there was no other sound in the city and under the city except whining and crying. The thousand households spread out their hands full of blood and looked left and right, shook their heads helplessly, and whispered with a full face: "I am a generation of military households, my ancestors have been the infinite kindness of this Ming Dynasty, so I want to be loyal to this Ming Dynasty, even if I starve to death now, I must be loyal, this is my ancestor's family motto, I have nothing to do, if not, just look at the current rotten appearance, I also go up the mountain, take my brother to find food and drink." ”

Zhang Yuan was shocked, how could he say such nonsense in front of civil officials at this time? It's not looking for death or what? With good intentions, he immediately grabbed the arm of the thousand households and reminded him in a low voice: "My lord is cautious." ”

"Only rotten life, how can you be cautious?" The thousand households suddenly threw Zhang Yuan's arm away, and said nonchalantly: "I can't do it to the top, I can't do it to the bottom, I can only drink, you said let me destroy the fortress that the thieves are building outside the city, right?" Qianhu smelled Zhang Yuan, and also asked the brother behind him who had lowered his head in shame, and then pointed to the brother behind him: "Just these brothers who can't even hold knives and guns, and have no fighting spirit, go to attack those fierce intruders, how is this different from letting my brother die?" Especially. The tone suddenly changed to excitement again: "In particular, why should they die without receiving a penny of the silver bounty they deserved?" Why did you leave your wife and children to die for this sweet spring without any compensation? He raised his head and questioned loudly as if he was asking himself: "Lord Zhang, my lords, please tell me, is that a death?" Say it? ”

Looking at the dumb officials, Qianhu raised his head and smiled miserably: "I'm not afraid that everyone will join me and fear the enemy, nor will I be afraid that everyone will join me to cause trouble to the army, and I am not afraid that everyone will join me to be disloyal, anyway, I'm like this, anyway, we're already like this, we have no long things, only a rotten life, but this rotten life doesn't want to be abandoned in vain, because we still have too many worries, if you adults want me to take these brothers to hit the stone with an egg, forgive a certain person who can't obey his fate, I don't abandon the city and run away, because I still have a small family, I am ready to live and die with this city to repay the king's kindness, this is my duty, and there is no need to talk about anything else. Without saying much, he strode down the city with a few deputies of his own soldiers, leaving behind an embarrassed place where the adjutant officials looked at each other in embarrassment and could not speak.

It took Zhang Yuan a long time to come back to his senses, looking at the distant Qianhu and his military households, and looking at the hot construction site of the distant Black Tiger Village, and shook his head helplessly. I knew that the guards of the imperial court were unbearable, but I didn't expect that the situation of the guards was unbearable to this extent, the civil officials did not treat the soldiers as people, and the generals even treated the soldiers as cattle and horses, so how could they drive the soldiers to fight the battlefield? Their own funding is just a drop in the bucket, it is not better than help, not to mention what can be changed, this Ming has been completely rotten, rotten can not be repaired at all, it doesn't matter if a cave window is broken, it doesn't matter if the doors and windows are broken, but the whole cave is crumbling, so how to repair? Expect these soldiers who lack clothes, clothing, and food to exterminate the thieves for themselves, and contribute to the imperial court like Zhou Ji said? It was overwhelming, and then looking back at the exhausted son of Xiangyong, who had been traveling for five days and half a night, he couldn't go out of the city to make an appointment, so he could only watch that fortress like a sharp knife in his heart and throat, but he couldn't do anything.

Looking at the guards who were still shivering in the cold wind, holding swords and guns with a numb face, thinking about this Qianhu who still had some blood and some conscience, Zhang Yuan sincerely admired it.

(The above situation is not made up by myself, and there are books in history.) ）

The military system of the Ming Dynasty was based on the peasants at the beginning. Zhu Yuanzhang, Taizu of the Ming Dynasty, implemented the system of separating military and civilian registration, and the peasants who were organized into military households served as soldiers for generations. The government organized them according to the establishment of the health center and carried out the tuntian. Defend the city along the border guard post for three points, and plant for seven points; The interior is divided into two to defend the city, and eight is divided into tun. Each sergeant was given fifty acres of land and cattle and farming tools. Twelve stone of the harvest was given to the sergeants for their own consumption, and the rest was used as food and storage for the officers of the Guard. Under this system, the government only supervises the situation in the tuntian, and does not pay salaries. Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang once said proudly: I raise millions of soldiers, and it doesn't cost a grain of millet to the people. However, later, the law was born for a long time, and most of the army's tuntian was seized by officers, Haoyou, and internal supervisors. That is, as Lu Xiangsheng said: "There is less land and more military land." Over time, they are all occupied by the right. It is the increasing embarrassment of Yitun, and the army is becoming poorer and poorer. Even those who are in the army have no land, those who cultivate the land are not in the army, and the powerful invade and bully the fat family, and the public and private are in trouble because of what they are. After Yingzong, the wars along the border gradually increased, and the "martial law on the frontier" correspondingly increased the time for army training and garrisoning, and agricultural affairs were naturally affected. In addition, quite a number of tundi areas have been occupied by ethnic minorities with a hostile attitude, and there has been a situation in which "the fields are outside the enemy." Juntun was corrupted in name only, and Shangtun was completely destroyed by the abolition of the Kaizhong Salt Law, and the imperial court had to allocate money from the state treasury. After Wanli, the state finances could not make ends meet, and the situation of arrears of military salaries became more and more serious. Coupled with the deductions of the officials, the soldiers can receive very little money. In the late Ming Dynasty, when the famine continued for years and the price of grain rose sharply, the lives of the soldiers were even more desperate. In August of the seventh year of the Apocalypse, Hu Tingyan, the governor of Shaanxi, said: "Lingongbian's salary is short for five or six years, and the number is more than 200,000; Jinglu Border Fort is missing for two years and three years; From the 47th year of Wanli to the 6th year of the Apocalypse, Guzhen Jingyun owed a total of more than 159,000 taels of silver. At the beginning, the armies still sold arrows in clothes,----- but now they have ------ wives; At first, he begged along the street, but now he has left the army and absconded; At first, it was an occasional whisper in the sand, and now it is openly shouting. ”

During the Chongzhen period, when Lu Xiang was promoted to the governor of Xuanda, he reported to the imperial court after inspecting the Shanxi frontier: "The more I pay today, the hunger and cold are pressing." borrowed money to make bows, arrows, guns and knives, and still sold them. Many soldiers lined up in the martial arts, the golden wind was like an arrow, and the sick and stiff servants were told one after another. Every point of a soldier, there are single clothes, there are no hakama, there are few shoes and socks, the ministers see it and burst into tears. In another note, he added: "The army under his jurisdiction has not received a single cent of its salary since November and February of last year to the present. Although the soldiers set up the wall and stood in formation, riding on the horse, but there were human figures, which was completely lifeless. In the past, when he saw the ministers and governors coming, he knelt down on the road and knelt at the door, and they all complained. This time, they were all depressed. Isn't his heart very bitter, not very dangerous, not very urgent? Gai Zhichen couldn't respond to it, and the same was true if he asked for it, and the same was true if he didn't ask for it, so he didn't say anything with tears in his eyes. Weichen knew this, and he didn't feel tears coming out of his heart. In the middle of winter, the land is extremely congested, Hu Feng Shuo snow, biting and chilling, Weichen immediately re-furrowed, as if the war was unbearable, with the patrol service, and there are stiff and fallen horses. This generation has been guarding for many years, and there is no body clothes, and there is a full meal every day. The husband is not a son in the arms of Shengmingyu under the common people, ministers and others? Desperate, I can't bear to speak, and I can't bear to see death immediately. One town is like this, and three towns can be known. "The corruption of the military and government is also manifested in the serious weakening of the army's combat effectiveness, the endless mutinies and desertions, and the extreme laxity of military discipline.

But now it's still good, waiting for the May Tartars to enter Gyeonggi, the emperor issued an edict to King Qin, and the government along the way was even more reluctant to give money and food, as a result, a large number of officers and soldiers were scattered, but they did not dare to return to their hometowns, so they had to go up the mountain, or join the rebel army, and at that time there was no way to save it.

Of course, Zhang Yuan didn't know this, but Lu Shi knew, therefore, Lu Shi thought, as long as he repelled this encirclement and suppression of the official army, he would also exchange a long-term stable development time for the base area, and at the same time, he would also recruit more trained border troops.