At the beginning of December, Lin Hanlun and his mother, Princess Ningguo, returned to Yingtianfu, which had been away for a year.

Although it has only been less than a year, in the past ten months, Lin Hanlun has spent most of his time on the battlefield under difficult conditions, experiencing the tempering of iron and blood, and now he feels that he is incompatible with the prosperous capital.

The war in the extreme west had no impact on the great Ming Dynasty, and it was still singing and dancing everywhere.

Thinking of the soldiers who suffered in the extreme west, Lin Hanlun's heart was inevitably a little depressed.

Princess Ningguo comforted her son in turn. "The strength of the Lin family is based on the people of Shandong who went to Tanglin City with your grandfather and grandmother. It is precisely because of our blood and sweat that the Lin family can now occupy millions of square kilometers of land, and no one can compete with us. Don't talk about the Marquis' Palace, it's the Duke's Palace, the Prince's Palace, and who has more land than ours! ”

"Does everything have a price?"

Princess Ningguo sighed abruptly, and there was a trace of confusion in her expression. "Woe and blessing depend on blessing and misfortune lurk......"

As he gets older, Lin Hanlun gradually understands the fate between his elders. Her mother was a princess born to the queen, but she married her father, who was from a commoner background and had average qualifications.

Mother's heart is a little unwilling, so in the far west, she is still living in the dream of her youth. She has always maintained her glory as a princess, and has never taken the initiative to integrate into Tanglin City.

Her father loved her, so he spoiled her all the time. Grandma came from an ordinary background, and she didn't have many complaints about this noble daughter-in-law's noble style.

No matter how extravagant this daughter-in-law is, she tries her best to satisfy her and never restrains her.

Because she wants to use this daughter-in-law to make her Lin family a wealthy nobleman in the Ming Dynasty, so that the descendants of the Lin family will be like a nobleman, not reckless.

Over the years, if it weren't for the support of my grandmother, after the death of my grandfather and two uncles, Tang Lincheng would have fallen long ago.

So Lin Hanlun has long understood that he must work hard, not to disappoint his grandmother, and not to let his mother live a bad life.

Fortunately, in recent years, there have been many minerals around Tanglin City, and several expeditions to the west have also plundered a lot of wealth.

Although Tang Lincheng is under more pressure because of foreign enemies, when it comes to wealth and power, it is first-class in the entire Ming Dynasty.

The economic pressure is not great, but the military pressure is not small.

If it weren't for the emperor's grandfather who provided the repeating pistol this year, I'm afraid the Lin family would only be able to protect themselves.

When he was a child, Lin Hanlun once complained about the emperor's grandfather, thinking that with such a strong strength of the Ming Dynasty, why didn't he directly destroy the enemy, but let the Lin family face the enemy alone.

But now, he's got it. This is the opportunity given to the Lin family by the emperor's grandfather. If the imperial court sent troops to destroy the enemy, then the role of the Lin family would be reduced.

At that time, could the Lin family still have the tens of thousands of troops it has now? No!

The Lin family is a knife that has been sharpened all the time deliberately left by the emperor's grandfather, and it must always be sharp.

This is also the future of the Lin family and his mission.

He also gradually understood Tang Sai'er's intentions. This grandmother of hers has been fighting all her life and working hard for the fate of the Lin family.

This expedition to the west is the biggest dream of her life.

In the past, because there were too few troops, they couldn't hold the territory even if they grabbed it.

But now, the population of the Lin family's territory has exceeded 500,000, and the grandmother wants to beat those white people at one time and leave a bigger family business for her children and grandchildren.

He knows that he can help his grandmother now, but he will definitely be able to help her with all her worries.

"Mother, this time I went to the capital, the emperor's grandfather, I want you to please more. Aunt Yongheng has been praised by the emperor's grandfather because of her actions this summer, which also shows that the emperor's grandfather is not taboo for your daughters to interfere in politics. ”

Princess Ning Guo shook her head and said, "You think too simply, how can you know your imperial ancestor better than me?" What's more, Yongheng is meddling in foreign affairs, and it really involves military affairs, and the more I interfere, the worse it will be.

As the queen's own daughter, she has received much more education than ordinary princesses since she was a child.

She knew very well that her father was a man of great talent, and she never wanted to mix personal feelings in the affairs of her family and country.

Yongheng took advantage of a loophole and used his convenience in Europe to help the General Administration Department provide some help in the links that they could not reach.

Even so, she did not directly participate in the direct distribution of benefits of Daming, so their father would be greatly rewarded.

But now it is different, Tang Lincheng wants to take the initiative to start a war, which involves a large number of military materials, even including the allocation of troops and the tilt of resource distribution.

If she really wants to do more benefits for the Lin family, she can't interfere too much.

Even if she is now the daughter-in-law of the Lin family and the mistress of Tang Lincheng, but first of all, she is the daughter of her father and the princess of the Ming Empire.

Lin Hanlun was a little disappointed, but Princess Ning Guo said again: "Let's go to see your imperial ancestor together, I am only responsible for crying to him about the hardships of Tang Lincheng's life, and you have to do the rest by yourself." Remember, except for your emperor and grandfather, you don't want to run away from anyone. This empire will always belong to your emperor's grandfather! ”

Hearing his mother's words, Lin Hanlun slowly figured out what was going on. He suddenly realized that this mother, who was originally pampered in his eyes, would only spend money and only enjoy, was actually not as simple as it seemed.

Although he didn't come back to Yingtianfu for only a year, when he came to Yingtianfu here, Lin Hanlun already felt that he couldn't keep up with the times.

Ying Tianfu's phone that just appeared was able to transmit sound for thousands of miles. And if the telephone line is connected to Tanglin City, doesn't that mean that in the future, people in Tanglin City will be able to talk directly to the emperor's grandfather?

And if the telephone is popularized, then where in addition to natural and man-made disasters, where there is a war, Ying Tianfu will soon be able to know.

The day after they returned, Ning Guo and Lin Hanlun were summoned by Zhu Zhanji, and after reading the thick stack of military intelligence reports written by Tang Sai'er, Zhu Zhanji asked Lin Hanlun what he had seen and heard in the army, so he sent him to the Ministry of National Defense to explain to the generals of the General Staff some problems that had arisen in the process of the widespread use of repeating guns.

Lin Hanlun didn't even have a chance to speak to Zhu Zhanji, so he was sent out of the palace, and he was inevitably a little depressed in his heart.

Leaving Princess Ning Guo in front of him, looking at her plain clothes, Zhu Zhanji sighed. "Since you are back, you can stay in the capital until your mother's queen is full of filial piety and then return to Tanglin City."

Princess Ning Guo was unwilling to accept such an arrangement. "Father, mother-in-law went west, Han Sheng sat in the rear, even Han Lun had to accompany the army, how could my daughter stay in the capital alone to enjoy happiness?"

"Don't think I don't know what you're doing in Tanglin City, there are not many of you in Tanglin City, and there are a lot of you less."

"But as long as my daughter stays in Tanglin City, won't she be able to make the people feel at ease? Isn't this also the biggest role of me as a princess? ”

Zhu Zhanji heard the resentment in her tone, but he didn't take it to heart. "You are a princess born from the queen, and marrying Lin Hansheng is indeed a bit condescending. But if it weren't for a man like Lin Hansheng and a mother-in-law like Tang Sanjie, would you be able to live so happily? The Lin family's situation over the years is indeed more difficult than that of other families, but isn't the wealth and strength of the Lin family the biggest in the Ming family?

This time, not only will you stay in the capital, but even Han Lun, I will not let him go back. Because this time, I want to completely solve the Lin family's worries. ”

Ning Guofeng's eyes widened slightly, and he looked at Zhu Zhanji and was speechless for a while.

Zhu Zhanji said: "In the past, it was because the population was too small, so I let those Slavs leave them alone. But now that there are more than a million people in the three cities of Tanglin and more than two million Han people in the Hezhong Governor's Mansion, as long as a big victory will hurt the Slavs and drive them away, you people will have twenty years of development, and the population will barely be able to hold the territory.

However, Ning Guo has you thought about it, if I fight the border of the Ming Dynasty all the way to Moscow, then where should your Lin family go? After thinking about this matter, you can tell me again......"

For Tang Sai'er, Ning Guo and Lin Hanlun, the Lin family's affairs are a big deal.

But for Zhu Zhanji, the Lin family's affairs are just a little bit of the Ming Empire.

Now except for North Africa, Europe, West Asia, and other regions are all under the control of the Ming Dynasty, and the Europeans can't turn the sky over now, and he thinks more about the long-term continuation of the Ming Dynasty.

The long-term stability of a country is, at any time, the stability of its political structure, the stability of its economic development, its leading position in science and technology, and the stability of its military command.

Daming's science and technology and economy are already in the world's leading position, especially after the advent of the telephone, Zhu Zhanji is no longer afraid of being monopolized by officials.

In terms of politics, after decades of uninterrupted adjustments, the scope of political power, legislative power, supervision power, and military power has been delineated by him.

Any minister, even the current Prime Minister Yu Qian, has a very limited scope of management. He can't control the military; He can't control the law enforcement agencies; He can't control the legislative power.

There is the emperor above the prime minister, and the speaker and the secretary general are at the same level as him, and everyone can only manage a share of the affairs within their authority, so they are not afraid of the appearance of powerful ministers.

Therefore, Zhu Zhanji is now beginning to consider weakening the military power.

Since the Xungui family has been divided overseas, including his sons, the clan has also been divided overseas, and now there is no particularly powerful Xungui family in the Ming Dynasty.

At present, around the Ming Dynasty, there are only three dukes' palaces that still have the right to command the army, namely the Mu family of the Duke of Qianguo, who guarded the Burma of later generations, the British Duke Zhang's family, the Assam of later generations, and the Zheng family of the Duke of Wuguo, who guarded the river.

The other military guards, because they do not have to directly face the war, belong to the active command of the army.

That is to say, the military guards of each ministry are fixed, but the officials above the command and envoy are all mobile, and they are changed every three to six years, so as to prevent the generals from supporting the army and respecting themselves.

Each nobleman or general can only be according to the rank, and there are ten to three hundred personal guards who directly obey the generals.

In addition to them, the Ming Dynasty also had an exception in the three cities of the extreme west, where Tang Sai'er himself brought over from Shandong, and the right to lead the troops had always been in their hands.

If the Ming Dynasty does not advance westward, they will be the northwest frontier of the Ming Dynasty, but if the Ming Dynasty really hits Moscow, or even Central Europe, when Western Europe goes, their location will become the hinterland of the Ming Dynasty.

has become the hinterland of the Ming Dynasty, if you still want to have the right to lead troops like now, it is impossible.

Therefore, Tang Sai'er wanted to go west, and Zhu Zhanji supported it. However, how to rearrange it after the fight is a matter that needs to be carefully considered.

That night, Lin Mansion, Ning Guo, Lin Hanlun, and Lin Xi, the fourth elder of the Lin family, discussed in the study for most of the night.

Ning Guo wanted to give up military power, and in the future, the Lin family would mainly run Tang Lin City.

Lin Hanlun was unwilling to give up military power, and wanted the Lin family to continue to move west and act as the gatekeeper of the Ming Dynasty.

And Lin Xi has other ideas......

From being injured on the battlefield, a generation of fierce generals Lin Xi has turned into a weak man who can't help but be weak, but his experience and insight have not been left behind.

After the telegraph line was installed in Tanglin City, coupled with the smooth passage of the railway, the Ming Dynasty's dominance over the border was much stronger.

Now, the telephone has also been invented, and the affairs of the border can be contacted with Ying Tianfu with a phone call, which has weakened the role of the nobles in disguise.

In Lin Xi's view, unless the Lin family has been moving forward bravely and acting as the vanguard of the Ming Dynasty's westward expansion, otherwise, the military power will be slowly given up after all.

But there are only two people left in the second generation of the Lin family, and the third generation has not grown up, and now it is just in a situation of lack of success.

Moreover, if the Lin family wants to develop for a long time, they can't let the children go to the battlefield one by one. The people are gone, and no matter how big the territory is, it will be empty.

So he doesn't support Lin Hanlun's idea.

Ning Guo's idea is feasible, but if the border of the Ming Dynasty really hits Moscow, how long can the Lin family of Tanglin City, which has become the rear, be able to defend it?

The three of them discussed for most of the night, and finally decided to send a telegram to Tang Lincheng first to ask Tang Sai'er and Lin Chu's opinions.

"Tomorrow, I will go to see my father again, he likes to play with people's hearts, but I don't believe that he will ignore the love of father and daughter and not give my Lin family a way to live."

Of course Zhu Zhanji won't. He knew that Ning Guo and the others sent a telegram back to Tang Lincheng to ask Tang Sai'er and Lin Chu's opinions, and he also prepared a few choices for the Lin family here.

Facing Ning Guo's questioning, he said directly: "Tang Lincheng I will reward the Lin family, and in the future, as the fief of the Lin family, the Ming Dynasty will not fall, and the Lin family will continue." However, Mrs. Tang Rongma has been riding for a lifetime, and she should also enjoy a few years of blessings. ”

Ning Guo asked: "My father has used the Lin family for more than 40 years, and now I see that there are more Han people in the extreme west, have you crossed the river and demolished the bridge?" ”

Zhu Zhanji glanced at her obliquely, and said with a smile: "You don't have to deliberately provoke me, I have always been very sober about national affairs." can be used by me, which shows that the Lin family still has the value of use. If it's really not worth being used by me, that's really sad.

In the past few decades, although I have been using the Lin family, has my Ming Dynasty's support for the Lin family been less? Without my Ming Army, would the Lin family really be able to fight against each other? The Lin family did contribute, so I was willing to let the Lin family guard Tang Lin City in the era, but I just gave up military power, so I really can't accept it? ”

"Then what should my Lin family do about this expedition to the west?"

"I still ordered your mother-in-law to be the commander-in-chief, but I will send 50,000 troops from Beiming Mountain, 100,000 troops from the Hezhong Army, and gather 200,000 elite troops to sweep the world in one fell swoop."

It was only when the New Year was approaching that Tang Sayer received news from the city of Tanglin.

This expedition to the west was requested by her on her own initiative, the purpose of which was to rely on the strength of the Lin family to obtain more room for the Lin family to turn around before the imperial court.

But after receiving the telegram, she knew that her plan had already been seen through by His Majesty.

His Majesty is unwilling to let the Lin family tail be thrown off, but this is also the protection of the Lin family.

In the future, the Lin family can guard Tang Lin City for generations, and they will no longer have to face the threat of the enemy, so they should be satisfied.

Commanding an army of 70,000 to feed hundreds of thousands of people, she was also tired.

Before she died, she became the commander of the first army and led the army to the west, which is also His Majesty's reward for her for decades.

On the night of the New Year's Eve, Don Sayer returned from Nizhny Novgorod to the city of Donlin. Facing Lin Chu, who was still a little unwilling, she shook her head and sighed: "You are not a general, and I am not far away, and they will lose their lives on the battlefield in the future." Now that my Lin family is prosperous and wealthy, and I can still pass on the order in peace, it is already Your Majesty's kindness, accept your fate......"

On the first day of the Lunar New Year, Yingtianfu's West Road telegraph room received an extra-long telegram from Tang Lincheng, Tang Sai'er and Jixi Hou Lin Chu fully accepted Zhu Zhanji's conditions, and gave up military power after this westward expedition.

On the fifth day of the Lunar New Year, Zhu Zhanji sent a telegram to Tang Lincheng, appointing Tang Sai'er as the marshal of the expedition to the west, Zheng Ying, the new Duke of Wuguo, Cheng Anbo Guo Ang as the deputy marshal, and Liu Qi, the Duke of Anguo, as the chief officer of the rear army. The Ming Empire dispatched 200,000 troops to the west.

On the sixth day of the first lunar month, the front page of the Daming Daily published an article on the Western Expedition and various appointments of soldiers.

On the eighth day of the first lunar month, 2,000 trucks carrying hundreds of thousands of guns and ammunition, as well as artillery, set off from Yingtianfu. He was accompanied by 30,000 elite young troops, who were also the first troops to be dispatched.

Beginning on the sixteenth day of the first lunar month, there was an endless stream of trains from Beiping and Beimingshan, and each train was full of food and supplies.

On the first day of February, Zheng Ying, the governor of Hezhong, convened the chiefs of the northwestern tribes, and after that, all the leaders of the tribes and states were left in the army.

On 14 February, the various departments sent a total of 150,000 auxiliary troops to follow the Ming army to the west.

Zheng Ying personally led 80,000 Ming cavalry and 100,000 auxiliary troops from Samarkand to the northwest, aiming at Batu Sarai, the capital of the Golden Horde.

Another 20,000 Ming cavalry with 50,000 auxiliary troops went directly to the north, joined Guo Ang, and unified under the command of Tang Sai'er.

On February 17, the 50,000 troops sent by Beiming Mountain began to board the trains, each carrying 1,000 Ming soldiers to Tanglin City.

From the end of February, the improvised barracks outside Tanglin began to be overcrowded, and large numbers of soldiers were transported by 2,000 trucks to the front line in Nizhny Novgorod.

In mid-March, even the bitterly cold Far West ushered in the warmth of spring, but the general offensive had not yet begun.

Because of the limited number of trucks, more troops still had to rely on horses to travel.

Only by waiting for the grass in the field to grow, hundreds of thousands of military horses did not need to prepare more hay.

For the army, there is no shortage of hay and beans, but transportation is always a big problem.

When the time entered April, Yingtianfu was already about to enter summer, and the army of the Western Expedition had finally formed an offensive formation along the Caspian Sea and the Volga River.

Lin Hanlun has been staying in Yingtianfu for the past few months, but he has not forgotten his responsibility, and he has been paying attention to the situation of the Western Expedition Army every day.

At this time, he realized that the war machine of the Ming Dynasty was running so amazingly.

The food and grass supplies, the arms and ammunition, the artillery, all came in batches.

In particular, a few automobile manufacturers, they could prepare thousands of cars at the beginning of the war, which Lin Hanlun did not dare to imagine at all.

After the first armies were transported, they were followed by artisans and auxiliaries. They did not participate in the war, they went to the Far West to start building roads for the Far West.

If you want to keep the places you have never touched before, you have to build concrete roads from the beginning.

Tang Sai'er, who was held at the beginning, was already numb when he got to the back. She knew very well that these cars, these artillery, these ammunition, after they arrived here, they would not be transported back.

The imperial court spent so much manpower and material resources to fight this war, and the results were, of course, to be received in their own pockets.

Tang Sai'er no longer thinks about how to plan for the Lin family, the first thing she has to do is to lead these hundreds of thousands of troops to fight a big victory, only in this way can she live up to His Majesty's trust.

In the past few decades, she and Lin San have often been weak against strong, and they have never been so extravagant.

She used to lead less than 100,000 people at most, but now, there are 200,000 elites in the Ming Dynasty alone, 50,000 auxiliary troops, and plus the auxiliary troops of various ethnic groups, the number has exceeded 400,000.

Moreover, in this war, not only the issue of grain and grass is considered, but now a large number of cars have been driven to the front line, although these cars do not eat grass, but they have to drink oil!

Of course, Zhu Zhanji also took this into account, so the war was the first to start in Batu Salai.

Batu Sarai is no longer found on the map, and its location is on the banks of the Volga River between Volgograd and Astrakhan.

Zheng Ying led a large army to occupy this place with great effort, and then attacked all the way to the south.

At the end of March, Zheng Ying captured the Azerbaijani tribes in the southern part of the Golden Horde.

At this time, from the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, hundreds of craftsmen sent by the Ming Dynasty and an elite army of 3,000 young troops came to the ancient city of Baku by boat.

The extraction of fire oil began here four hundred years ago, and the goal of the Ming Dynasty was to use these oil oils.

Before the factory was established, Daming used the proposed distillation equipment made of iron pots and iron pipes to directly refine gasoline and diesel.

The critical points of natural gas, gasoline, diesel, and heavy oil (asphalt) are all different, and if you are not afraid of waste, even a pot can refine gasoline and diesel.

And when gasoline and diesel were refined, a large number of Turkmen, Uzbek, and Tatar auxiliary armies began to drive horse-drawn carriages and became oil carriers for the Ming army.

Preparations continued until mid-April, when Don Sayle, a female marshal admired by countless soldiers, gave the order for a general attack in Nizhny Novgorod.

And the torrent of steel, which the Slavs had never seen before, rolled in with an unstoppable momentum.