According to Zhang Liao's knowledge, there should have been four major empires in the world during this period, with the Han Dynasty in the east, and the Kushan Empire, the Anxi Empire, and the Roman Empire in the west.

As for the current situation of these empires, Zhang Liao is not very clear, he only knows the name and approximate location, from the mouths of the Western Regions, he knows that the adjacent Kushan Empire, that is, the Dayue clan in the Han population, is very powerful at this time, and for more specific information, it needs to be investigated slowly in the future.

Now that the Central Plains is undecided, Zhang Liao will not take the liberty of crossing the Green Ridge to provoke other empires, but fortunately, the Kushan Empire, which is closest to the Great Han, is separated from the Western Regions by the natural barrier of the Green Ridge, so that the Great Han is separated from the West, even when it is the most chaotic and weak, the West will not take the opportunity to attack.

The green ridge is the Pamir Plateau, that is, the Buzhou Mountain in ancient myths and legends, the Himalayas, the Karakoram Mountains, the Kunlun Mountains, the Tianshan Mountains, the Hindu Kush Mountains five major mountain ranges converge here, the mountains are undulating, continuous, the snow peaks stand together, towering into the clouds, and it is extremely difficult to climb over.

More than a hundred years ago, the Guishan Dynasty of the Dayue clan sent 70,000 troops to cross the Green Ridge with the intention of attacking Ban Chao, but after suffering the defeat, he retreated, and never dared to cross the Green Ridge again, which allowed Zhang Liao to calmly clean up the situation in the Western Regions.

In fact, for more than a year, Zhang Liao has been cleaning up the situation in the Western Regions.

A year and a half ago, that is, in the spring of the third year of Jian'an, Zhang Liao, who was in Yecheng, Hebei Province at that time, received a message from Zuo Ci Feige, and Jingjue was attacked by Shanshan and was in danger.

Not to mention the factors of Zuo Ci and Su Wu in the Elite State, Zhang Liao was already planning the Western Regions at that time, but he didn't have a suitable opportunity.

There needs to be a justifiable reason for sending troops to a multi-country region like the Western Regions, otherwise it will cause the local countries to have a sense of crisis and xenophobia, and share the same hatred for the enemy, so that the strategy of attacking the Western Regions will be half the effort, which is not what Zhang Liao wants.

And Zuo Ci's letter can be said to have sent a pillow to Zhang Liao when he was sleepy, which made his mood suddenly brighten.

In the sense of reason, in the public and private, Zhang Liao did not hesitate, he immediately flew a pigeon to pass the book, and ordered Xu Rong and Fan Chou, who had entered the Western Regions, to raise the banner of rescuing the Elite Country, and take Shanshan Country with the momentum of thunder.

Shanshan's real name is Loulan, more than 1,600 miles away from Yangguan, the former Han warrior Fu Jiezi killed the king of Loulan and changed the name of his country to Shanshan.

Thirty years in Hedong and thirty years in Hexi, according to the news received by Zhang Liao, in the Liangzhou Rebellion and the Western Regions were cut off in the past ten years, Shanshan gradually became stronger, there were about 15,000 people in the former Han Dynasty, and now many small countries have been annexed, with a population of more than 30,000, which is already a superpower in the Western Regions.

And Shanshanguo's position is extremely critical, guarding the entrance of the South Silk Road, and occupying nearly half of the South Road, which is the place where Zhang Liao must control the Western Regions.

After giving orders to Xu Rong and Fan Chou, Zhang Liao quickly rushed to the Western Regions with Dian Wei.

When they arrived in Liangzhou, news came from the Western Regions that Xu Rong and Fan Chou had taken Shanshanguo.

Zhang Liao was not surprised to receive this news, in fact, no matter how powerful Shanshan Guo is, it is also in the Western Regions, there are 30,000 people in the entire Shanshan country, and only a few thousand can fight, and Xu Rong and Fan Chou brought 20,000 soldiers and horses, how can Shanshan Guo resist.

However, what made Zhang Liao laugh was that Zuo Ci also went out in this battle, he relied on his skills to sneak directly into the capital of Shanshanguo, captured Shanshan King and several generals, and handed them over to Xu Rong and Fan Chou, Xu Rong and Fan Chou hung Shanshan King and those generals in front of them when they attacked the city, and the defenders of Shanshan were all dumbfounded, and it was almost bloodless to capture Shanshanguo.

When Zhang Liao arrived in the Western Regions, Shanshan Guo was already completely under control, and the first thing Zhang Liao did was to appoint the protector of the Western Regions.

Although they Xu Rong and Fan Chou easily took Shanshan Kingdom, it was not easy to truly control the entire Western Regions Protectorate.

Because most of the land in the Western Regions is a desert, that is, the Taklamakan Desert, compared with the desert of the entire Western Regions, the oasis occupies a very small proportion of the area, and the distance between the oasis and the oasis is very far, often reaching hundreds of miles, and the middle is a desert, the environment is harsh, and it is very dangerous to walk back and forth.

Because most of the oases are limited in area, the food that can be produced is very limited, and each oasis can support very few troops, and the unique environment leads to the inability to have enough troops to unify the Western Regions, so the Western Regions is composed of a large number of independent small countries, with nearly fifty names and surnames, in addition to many horse bandits, tribal forces, and countless others.

After the former Han Dynasty set up the Western Regions Protectorate, they encountered this problem, the food produced in the oasis was limited, and it was also impossible for the Han Dynasty to station a large number of troops in the Western Regions for a long time.

The reason why Zhang Qian was able to persuade the Western Regions countries was that Wei Qing and Huo Qubing defeated the Xiongnu during the same period and showed their strength to the Western Regions.

But none of them lasted, one was the phased decline of the Han Dynasty's armed forces, and the other was that the Han Dynasty's attention to the Western Regions and the lack of governance efforts, and the Han culture and Confucianism did not spread to this area.

Therefore, in order to truly incorporate the Western Regions into the territory of the Han Dynasty, governance and education are very crucial.

Zhang Liao could not stay in the Western Regions forever, and if he wanted to control the situation in the Western Regions, he must choose a person who was strong enough to control the overall situation to serve as the protector of the Western Regions and handle the affairs of the Western Regions.

This candidate is worth thinking about by Zhang Liaofei, there are a lot of things he can do, Xun Yu and Fu Zhu, but the center has just been established, and Xun Yu and others need to straighten it out, Jizhou, Liangzhou, Yuzhou, and Yangzhou have just settled down, and they all need these people to sit in charge, and they are not suitable for transfer for the time being.

So Zhang Liao set his sights on a person, Tian Feng.

After Yuan Shao's defeat, Tian Feng escaped a catastrophe under the secret protection of Zhang Liao's faction, but although this person was talented, he was a strong bull.

Zhang Liao previously stayed in Yecheng on the one hand to stabilize Jizhou, and on the other hand, for Tianfeng.

He visited several times, and after having a deep conversation with Tian Feng, he found that Tian Feng was ashamed of Yuan Shao's defeat and was unwilling to go out of the mountain again.

However, Zhang Liao already had a plan in his heart, he knew that Tian Feng was reluctant to go out of the mountain, mainly because of the problem of face, not to mention that Yuan Shao and Zhang Liao had a hostile relationship before, and Tian Feng's defection to him was equivalent to defecting to the enemy, which was difficult for Tian Feng to accept.

Zhang Liao noticed this, so when talking to Tian Feng, he inadvertently mentioned Ban Chao's exploits in the Western Regions, and was greatly admired, and talked about the vast world beyond the Western Regions, exaggerating the strength of the Kushan Empire, and deepening the external crisis faced by the Han Dynasty.

Tian Feng was unwilling to be empty in his heart, and after listening to Zhang Liao's talk about the Western Regions and even the world outside the Western Regions, he couldn't help but be moved, and when he heard the strength of several other empires, he couldn't help but be awe-inspired. Zhang Liao took the opportunity to ask Tian Feng to serve as the protector of the Western Regions, expand the territory, make people from afar to serve, and sow Confucianism to the world outside the Han Dynasty.

This is the transfer of internal contradictions to the outside, which is enough to dispel Tian Feng's heart knot.

Sure enough, Tian Feng did not refuse, and finally decided to rush to the Western Regions with Zhang Liao to educate Yidi.

After arriving in the Western Regions, Zhang Liao immediately appointed Tian Feng as the protector of the Western Regions, Yang Han as the captain of Wuji, and led 5,000 soldiers and horses to assist Tian Feng in governing the Western Regions.

Tian Feng is good at government affairs, and his strategies and methods are first-class, but his skills are poor, while Yang Han is flexible and changeable, seemingly honest but cunning, and he is really like a fish in water in the complex environment of dozens of countries in the Western Regions.

Zhang Liao also appointed Fu Du as the chief of the Western Regions. The Silk Road is divided into two routes, north and south, from Dunhuang County, around the Great Desert to the west, from Shule and Shache Kingdom to merge.

In this way, the Western Regions are all protected by Tianfeng in the east, sitting in Loulan, connecting Yanqi and Qiuci to the west, and Shanshan and Khotan to the south.

The deputy Shi Fujun, the head of the Western Regions, is in the west, sitting in Shule, which is equivalent to the position where Ban Chao was located at the beginning, connecting Gumo and Weitou in the north, and Shache, Khotan, and Jingjue in the south, and Tian Feng took care of each other to ensure the smooth flow of the Silk Road.

As for the choice of Fujun, it naturally has another meaning, but it is not enough for outsiders.

After the personnel were appointed, it was a thunderous military operation.

After more than ten years of the decline of the Han Dynasty, the countries of the Western Regions inevitably had other thoughts, and the most effective means for the countries in these regions was a strong military deterrent.

First power and then grace, deterrence and power, and then give grace and teach it to change, in order to receive twice the result with half the effort.

Zhang Liao's plan was that Xu Rong and Fan Chou set out from the North Road and swept through the front and rear of the Che Division, Yanqi, Qiuzi and other countries.

At this time, the Northern Xiongnu had already declined, and the Wusun in the northern part of the Tianshan Mountains was originally not small, but since two hundred years ago, it was divided into two royal systems, large and small, and there was a lot of internal strife, chaos, and there was no time to take care of anything else.

As for the southern road, after the Shanshan Kingdom and the Jingjue Kingdom were decided, the western powers were Khotan and Shache, and Zhang Liao took Dian Wei and Yang Han to personally conquer them, and finally the north and south roads met in Shule to complete the control of the entire Western Regions Protectorate.

The more severe the fighting environment, the more prominent the strategic superiority of the elite troops, the less grain and grass can be transferred, and the degree of mobility and flexibility is high; in the desert area where oases are scattered in the Western Regions, an army of tens of thousands of people may not be as good as a dozen or so small troops.

In particular, Dian Wei's Tiger Battalion and Zhang Liao's Guard Battalion are best at small special operations, which can be described as a fish in water in the Western Regions.

Even so, Zhang Liao did not dare to be careless.

He knew that fighting in a place like the Western Regions, the biggest threat was not the strength of the countries in the Western Regions, but the great desert, and if it was not handled well, the non-combat attrition was far more terrible than the combat loss.

There are too many variables in the desert, such as getting lost, lack of water, sandstorms, and the most terrible quicksand in the Taklamakan Desert.

Before the war, Zhang Liao equipped the soldiers and horses of the two roads with enough water bottles, guide cars, compasses, maps, as well as medical teams and camel baggage teams.

He also specially organized the army to conduct special training in desert warfare, first of all, training how to combine a compass and a map to recognize the way, and then how to camp in the desert, find water, identify quicksand, and be alert to sandstorms and many crises to save oneself.

After three months of training in Loulan, the scouts had already found out the news from the north and the south, and then the army divided into two ways and entered the desert.

At the same time, the caravan also began to establish its first stronghold in Loulan, and when Zhang Liao came to the Western Regions, he not only brought Su Wu and Mi Zhen, but also Zhongshan Zhen, Zhang Shiping and Su Shuang, the big businessmen who had cooperated with Zhang Liao before, were all moved by Zhang Liao's words, and they came here one after another to become a part of the reconstruction of the Silk Road.