"Qiongzhou?"

"The Geeyang Army?"

When they heard Zhao Lie's new proposal and new location, they were all stunned - if there were glasses at this time.

Qiongzhou is the Hainan Island of later generations. In the Song Dynasty, it was a wild and outlying place dedicated to the distribution of officials. The famous Su Shi Su Dongpo once flowed with Qiongguan (Qiongzhou Prefecture, now Haikou Fucheng), for this place, the most familiar is Su Liuyi.

Su Liuyi first objected: "In the autumn and winter of last year, Qiongzhou was still in my hands, and the Yuan general Ali Hague attacked Qiongzhou. Zhao Youluo, the pacification envoy of Qiongzhou, led Xie Ming, Xie Fu, Ran Anguo, and Huang Zhijie to resist the Yuan army at Baishakou for several months, so that Ali Haiya's boat division could not land for a long time. At that time, if he could ascend to Qiong and join forces with Zhao An's pacification envoy, it would be promising. hated the people of the state, did not know loyalty, did not sympathize with the country, and launched a rebellion, and Zhao pacified the envoy and the Yuan, causing the five righteous people to be torn apart. The land of barbarians, without integrity and disregard for kindness and righteousness, is not enough to be a foundational place. ”

Zhang Shijie was very unimpressed with this young man from the clan, and said lightly: "At present, the entire territory of Qiongzhou is in the hands of the Yuan captives, and Qiongguan City is stationed in the Yuan army, and it is not easy to capture it." Meng Bei is young and sharp, and it is good to forge ahead, but he must know that he knows the way of his opponent. ”

Wen Tianxiang and Yang Liangjie also think that this proposal is not advisable, which is completely contrary to their theory of "abandoning the border wasteland and going to a big port".

Only Chen Yizhong heard another meaning: "Meng Beifang only talked about the Jiyang Army, it seems that he has also heard of it, and there are rumors that it is a big port of Jiancheng......"

Yang Liangjie disagreed: "Qiongzhou's government and three armies, all of which are inferior military states, and the public party is still a dormitory, where can you come to the big port?" ”

"There are no absolutes in the world, sometimes it's so strange, Jiyang Military City is a strong city." Zhao Lie spread out a drawing that had been prepared long ago, and asked the ministers to come close and watch.

"This is Qiongguan, here is the Wan'an Army, this is the Changhua Army, and this is the Jiyang Army (now Sanya, Hainan)." Zhao Lie pointed to a hand-painted map of Hainan Island, his fingers moved from north to south, and he talked eloquently, "After Ali Hague captured Qiongguan, he told the three armies of Wan'an, Changhua, and Jiyang. In other words, the three armies surrendered without a fight, and the city was not destroyed - in fact, the Changhua military city was only a military fort, and the Wan'an military city was only a small city. Only the Jiyang army is covered with bricks and tiles, with a circumference of more than one mile, totaling two hundred and forty-two zhang, and a height of one zhang and six feet...... Open the east, west and south gates. There is also the Ningyuan "Hou River" flowing around the north of the city, the river is about eight miles long, and the water source is sufficient......"

"How is that possible!" Yang Liangjie was the first to shout, and the rest of the ministers were all shocked. Because the data given by Zhao Lie is too amazing, a low-class military state located in a corner of the sea and sky, with only a few hundred military and civilian households, and most of the surrounding people are fangmin, how can it be possible to build such a strong city, and dig a river for eight miles, what a big project is this? Is it necessary to carry out such a large project in the extreme southern corner of the sea and sky?

Zhao Lie didn't know much about the Song Dynasty or the ancient city, and he didn't understand why the ministers were so surprised. If he knew about the situation of the cities in the Song Dynasty, he was afraid that he would be even more surprised than the ministers.

Before the Song Dynasty, there were only 31 brick and stone cities in China, accounting for about 4% of the known cities. By the Song Dynasty, there were 383 well-documented cities, of which 84 were brick and stone cities, accounting for 18%. The local state armies of the two Song Dynasty were financially embarrassed, and many officials opposed the construction of the city. Even before the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, even the state and county government offices in Hainan were often limited to thatched houses. The huge amount of people's power spent on building the city is extremely prominent, not to mention the weakest inferior state army like Jiyang, which has nothing to do with resisting Jin and Mongolia.

And it should be pointed out that the difference between single bread bricks and double bread bricks is huge, and many brick cities in the Song Dynasty are only bricks of the city wall on the side of the enemy facing the enemy, and the inner side is still built of plates. This is naturally intolerant of heavy rain. No matter Qiongguan, it is just a single bread brick, Wan'an Army, and Changhua Army are rammed small cities, but the Jiyang Army is the top configuration - double bread bricks.

Among the four state armies in Qiongzhou, the Jiyang army is the most remote, the least householded, and the poorest, but the configuration is not under the strong city and big port of Guangnan. Moreover, even the imperial court was not very clear about this situation, so that a wealthy city was not stationed, but all went around in Nanenzhou (Guangya) and Ningdu (the base chosen by Su Liuyi in history). Isn't that weird?

The Jiyang Army, such a strange city that was born out of nowhere, immediately aroused the great interest of the ministers, and the first thing was to confirm the accuracy of Zhao Hunt's source.

"First of all, I didn't know anything about the situation in Qiongzhou in advance, these materials are all from the military and civilians below, and after repeated research, some of the news comes from the military families who once lived in Qiongzhou. I believe that they can't make up these things, and they don't need to, let alone do it. So, the credibility is high. After Zhao Lie clarified the source and relieved the ministers, he further analyzed, "At present, it is Long Wenxiang, the general under Ali Hague and the governor of Qiongzhou, who is stationed in Qiongguan. Zhongwanhu is the eldest son of Ali Hague, and the deputy Wanhu is Ma Chengwang. There are more than 5,000 management troops, of which the elite is 1,000 'Beiting Army', another 2,000 Han troops, and 2,000 new annex troops. The total strength of the entire Qiongzhou is only these 5,000 people, in addition to the main force stationed in Qiongguan, it is also necessary to be stationed in Wan'an, Changhua, and Jiyang armies to defend against the eight fangs. According to various intelligence, the garrison of the Jiyang Army was no more than 1,000 people, which belonged to the Han Army and the New Annexed Army. If I avoid Qiongguan, go around to Jiyang with lightning speed, and launch a surprise attack, with the deterrent power of the royal division against the new annexed army, I can take this city quickly, and think that Zhaoji is ......."

In the end, Zhao Lie reminded again: "I don't know why the Jiyang Army has such a strong city, I would rather regard this as a generous gift from God to my Great Song Dynasty." I hope you will calm down and think about whether or not you should take advantage of this opportunity – I would like to remind you that we are running out of time. The Yuan army will come at any time, it is better to leave early than to go late, and it is safe to leave early. ”

Zhao Lie's new proposal is too tempting. A rare fortified city, in line with Wen Tianxiang and Yang Liangjie's idea of "the holy queen should live in the big port of Jiancheng", but the location is a little remote, but it is safe.

At the same time, the Jiyang Army also conforms to the proposition that Zhang Shijie and Su Liuyi want to "find a place to build a foundation, and while accumulating valleys with troops, and negotiate with Fanren". It's just that it is difficult to recruit volunteers from all over the world, and the aspect of arming and fighting is limited by the geographical and sparsely populated area.

The ministers discussed repeatedly, and finally Chen Yizhong made a decision: "As Meng Bei said, this is a generous gift from God to my Great Song Dynasty - if you don't take it, you will be blamed for it." ”

Yang Liangjie also said: "Without further ado, it will change later." ”

So the ministers wrote together, asking the queen mother to issue an order to capture the Jiyang army and set the capital Zhaoji.