The horse bandits are ruthless, and they never leave a living mouth after they succeed, and Li Dudu's difficulty this time is also a fluke. ”

Chu Zhilian looked at the chopped carriage and arrows and corpses all over the ground, and said with palpitations: "They never look at the target, even the grain and grass of the officers and soldiers have been robbed, and the rules are strict, the rewards and punishments are clear, the weaker officers and soldiers are not their opponents, and the Emperor Fu has a headache for a long time, but there is nothing he can do about them." ”

Li Qing chewed a grass root in his mouth, walking in the crowd, after the horse bandits, the ground was full of wolves, the grain bags containing rice were split, the rice with white flowers was scattered all over the ground, and the pots and pots he brought were trampled into alien shapes by the horses' hooves, more than 100 soldiers were picking up copper coins all over the ground, extending more than 100 steps from the carriage containing money to the north, as if paving countless roads with copper coins, in the distance, the families of the fallen soldiers were crying for the sky and grabbing the ground, crying for their husbands or sons, this horse bandit attack, the Tang army killed 23 brothers, including a team leader, two gang leaders, There were also many people injured, they were all veterans who had been to Nanzhao with Li Qing, Li Qingxin was a little sad, and made a gesture to call a soldier, "You go and find the captain of the martial arts." ”

Wu Xingsu was also slightly injured in the battle, although he was wearing thick armor, but he was still shot by the opponent's armor-piercing cone arrow, the tip of the arrow penetrated the armor and shot the shoulder blade, it is ridiculous to say, this arrow is his own, the arrow shaft is engraved with the word 'Wu', he shot through the throat of a person, but was received by the leader of the horse bandits to pay tribute.

At this time, he was comforting his family, and when he heard Li Qing calling him, he hurriedly ran over. "What did the general call me?"

Li Qing first looked at his injuries, and said with a dumb smile: "Your own arrow, it feels kind!" ”

Wu Xingsu touched his back and said hatefully: "It's okay to be injured, but the anger in my heart is hard to calm down, I must catch this bandit leader and make up for his ten arrows." ”

Li Qing smiled slightly, "Yes." You'll have a chance. ”

He pointed to the relatives of the fallen soldiers in the distance, and said to Wu Xingsu: "You go and explain to them for me, give each person a pension of fifty yuan, and when this group of horse bandits is pacified, I will send someone to send them back to Chang'an." ”

Wu Xingsu received the order, but Chu Zhilian was surprised on the side: "Does Governor Li want to take revenge with one arrow?" ”

"Not exactly!"

Li Qing shook his head and said, "I don't think I want to take revenge on this bandit. But if they don't die, the trade in the Western Regions will be greatly affected, I think the merchants have already complained, I am also a merchant, how can I not know. ”

This is the truth, more than half of the customers in his own shop in Chang'an are Hu merchants from Dashi and the Western Regions, he served as the governor of Shazhou, and he wanted to vigorously develop trade, how could he let these horse bandits cut off his financial route.

Hearing Li Qing's thoughts, Chu Zhilian's face showed a strange expression. His lips moved, and he wanted to say something. But I held back.

"Brother Chu has anything to say to me?"

Li Qing wanted to know the meaning behind Chu Zhilian's expression, but Chu Zhilian bit his mouth. Never again.

.

After resting for two hours, the team set off slowly and headed for Shazhou, Li Qing did not go to Shouchang County, but went directly to Dunhuang County, where the state is located, and his family will also be there. Bed rest is urgently needed or there is a risk of miscarriage.

There are few people in Shazhou. The official setting is relatively simple, such as Shangzhou's Beijia, Sima, Changshi and other auxiliary officials are not set up, only the record of the military (equivalent to the secretary general of the city government), one person, and the seven Cao military (equivalent to the director of each bureau) one each, and other CPPCC, United Front and the like are not all, and there are some other small officials, such as the city order, school, medical Botu, this is the official in charge of industry and commerce, education, and health.

However, Shazhou is a metropolitan prefecture, the military and the government are integrated, its state officials are more focused on military affairs, and most of the local affairs are completed by the subordinate counties, Shazhou has only two subordinate counties, Dunhuang County and Shouchang County, and its Dunhuang County is a county, with 3,000 households; And Shouchang County is a lower county, with only 1,000 households.

The setting of the two counties is relatively simple, similar to Yibin County back then, so I won't talk much about it here, but there is one thing that must be said, compared with the political system of the Tang Dynasty and the Han and Jin Dynasties, there is one of the biggest characteristics, that is, the officials in the flow (that is, the officials above the grade) must be appointed by the central government, and the assassin can only appoint the officials at the first level by himself, and their support is paid from the rent of the public land, and even the assassin pays out of his own pocket.

Wang Changling, the former county governor of Yibin County, was re-employed by the imperial court on his recommendation and appointed Shazhou to serve as a military officer, while Gao Shi agreed to be his staff member and help him deal with the case in order to be promoted. As for the person who recommended him to organize the book for him, Li Qing didn't even see a figure, and it was best if he encountered wolves or horse bandits on the way.

Li Qing walked slowly, and the local officials who accompanied him, such as Zhang Xun, the new county magistrate of Dunhuang County, Wang Changling, Gao Shi, and even his butler Zhang Wang, had already arrived in Shazhou first.

A city wall in front is like a black jade belt horizontally placed in the vast Gobi, there is Dunhuang County, the city wall is tall and strong, reinforced over the years, just like the copper wall and iron wall, the moat is drawn from the sweet spring water that flows through the east of the city, the ditch is deep and the river is wide, and the general cloud ladder is difficult to cross.

"Governor Li, now that I have arrived at my destination, my mission has been completed, and I am leaving."

Chu Zhilian patted Li Qing on the shoulder, after more than 20 days of getting along, the relationship between them is very harmonious, and he is a little reluctant to say goodbye.

"Brother Chu take care all the way, please thank you on behalf of Lord Huangfu!"

Groups of cavalry passed by Li Qing one after another, and everyone waved goodbye one by one.

"Maybe when we fight with Tibet, we will fight side by side!" Chu Zhilian's war horse neighed, and led the army to gallop away, his figure became smaller and farther away, and gradually disappeared into the horizon.

Li Qing withdrew his farewell gaze and waved his hand laboriously, turned to look at this fortress on the Silk Road, he couldn't help but want to shout, from this moment on, he was the master of this city.

When Lord Assassin Shi arrived in Dunhuang County, there were already military and political local officials who went out of the city to greet him, and the so-called exit from the city was only fifty steps away from the city gate

The welcome ceremony is also quite different from later generations, there is no scene where children brave the wind and rain, and their faces are purple from the cold to welcome the leader, only a dozen officials are flattering, what young people can't say, it can only be said that the emperor has a discerning eye, under the rule of Li Dudu and Li Tingshi, Shazhou must be strong and strong, and the people live in peace, and a sentence of economic prosperity is added, but this subtext is that everyone is rich.

As for Gong Cao Zhang San and Cang Cao Li Si, these don't need to be introduced, they will be slowly replaced in the future, and there is no need to know, Li Qing is concerned about the plans of future generations, and he is anxious to send the curtain back to the house to recuperate, and he is too lazy to talk to them, so he generously agreed to go to the reception banquet tonight, what is the matter, talk about it at the wine table, although it is the Western Regions, but the wine table is in the same vein as the original.

Li Qing's governor's residence is in the heart of Dunhuang County, noisy, it was originally built by a big food merchant in the early Tang Dynasty, all the granite polished and masonry, the raw materials are transported from other places, the cost is not free, the result was the Shazhou Thorn History at that time, with a plan of smuggling crime, the big food merchant was repatriated to the country, this house was confiscated and confiscated, and then allocated to the leader for private use, of course, after the assassin Shi stepped down and returned to Beijing, this real estate could not be taken away, it was left to the next office, it has been a traditional Thorn Shi official residence, Li Qing arrived, only a little arrangement can be occupied, The role of the housekeeper is to make the master live comfortably in life, and the room allocation and the revision of the house rules are generally done by the hostess. As for how she allocates rooms and resettles her family, these trivial matters will not be mentioned, and Li Qing's family rules are not only available today.

Let's say that Li Qing has always been puzzled that the Doulu Army did not come forward to stop the horse bandits from attacking Shouchang County, and later Chu Zhilian's strange expression and desire to speak stopped making Li Qing faintly feel that he had something to do with the Doulu Army.

"What's in here?"

Li Qing couldn't hold back any longer, sent the curtain and them into the house, turned around and led his own soldiers to gallop out of the city, the army was the most important thing in his appointment this time. Only when he is in charge of the army can his waist be straightened, only when he leads the army can he have the opportunity to go to the battlefield, he can gain a firm foothold in the Longshuo Group, and his name of General Li is worthy of the name.

There were two garrisons for the Doulu army, and in the event of a war, the army would be stationed in the city. However, it could not be used in the city and could not be trained, so there was a camp three miles south of Dunhuang City, which was stationed in non-war times.

The military system of the Tang Dynasty has been implemented until the eighth year of Tianbao, and the soldiers of the government military system are returned to the military government, and they are uniformly deployed by the Ministry of War

For self-cultivated farmers, military service is the glorious obligation of the Tang people, and if they do not go, Yongye Tian will be cancelled. Not only do soldiers not have military pay, but they also pay for all their military rations, weapons and equipment, and military uniforms. That is, the state does not pay a single cent of military spending. However, the family has land as a pledge, and the peasants have to go, so the early Tang Dynasty has sufficient military resources and the national strength is at its peak, which is also because the uniform field system has been well implemented. There is no rebellion.

In fact, since Emperor Gaozong and Emperor Zetian, the land system of the Tang Dynasty has been gradually destroyed. Farmers lost their land, the country also lost the source of soldiers, twenty-five years after the opening of the Yuan Dynasty, the paid recruitment system gradually began to rise, mainly for the border, to the late Tianbao period of the festival envoys began to recruit troops privately, take other people's money, they have to listen to the words of others, until this time, each section of the envoy has its own army, this is the root of the outbreak of the Anshi Rebellion, is the root of the late Tang Dynasty feudal town separation, so it is not fair to completely put the responsibility of the Anshi Rebellion on Li Longji.

There were some other factors in the outbreak of the Anshi Rebellion, such as that there were too many strong enemies around the Tang Dynasty, and a strong military region had to be set up on the border.

Of course, the nature of the Anshi Rebellion and the secession of the feudal towns is different, the Anshi Rebellion is a rebellion by a person who wants to be the emperor, and the secession of the feudal towns is just a contest between the local government and the central government.

The words are a bit far-fetched, come back first, Li Qing led three hundred personal soldiers all the way to gallop, and arrived at the Doulu army camp after a while, and handed over the festival charm to the camp gate, the so-called festival symbol is the emperor's leading sign to the frontier general, only with the section or fish charm can lead the troops to fight, so the full name of Li Qing's official position is 'to make the festival governor of Shazhou military and Shazhou thorn history', and the festival envoy is also named after this.

Although there are only 4,000 troops in Shazhou, but the northwest is vast and sparsely populated, the military camp covers an extremely wide area, surrounded by a thick wooden fence, a trench is dug under the fence, and the antlers are buried, no horses are allowed to run in the barracks, everyone leads the horses, only to see that the barracks are spacious, rows of houses are neat and tidy, accommodation, horses, ordnance, and various functional areas are arranged in an orderly manner, and in front of the houses is a flat and vast training school, but what makes Li Qing strange is that there are few people and horses in the barracks, and there is no one in the barracks for a long time, almost all the barracks are empty, and it is noon at this time, Maybe the soldiers are all eating, the most important thing to be a leader is to have a good relationship with the grassroots, to care about the lives of the soldiers, 'good comrades, comrades have worked hard', this kind of official cliché is a hundred words, it is better to huddle together with the soldiers to have a meal, but more importantly, Governor Li Dadu's stomach is also hungry.

The soldiers' canteen is in the westernmost part of the military dormitory, consisting of more than a dozen large houses, which can accommodate thousands of people at the same time, Li Qing heard the sound of people in the house from afar, so he strode towards it in a hurry, several soldiers were squatting at the door to eat, and suddenly saw a high-ranking official coming, so frightened that he hurriedly stood up.

"Keep eating! Keep eating! ”

Li Qing waved his hand with a smile, lifted the leather curtain and looked over, and the noisy noise rushed to his face, only to see that the room was also spacious and bright, the size was like three classrooms in later generations, about 100 soldiers were eating, laughter, scolding sounded, suddenly saw a high-ranking officer calm down, Li Qingdi's heart gradually felt bad, he walked several canteens in a row, each canteen is more than 100 people, less than 70 or 80 people, so calculated, this military camp is only more than 1,000 people to eat? The book of the Ministry of War says that there are 4,000 people, what is going on?

Li Qingxin was suspicious, and he was just about to ask the guide officer beside him, and the door next to him

, A tall lieutenant walked out, he raised his eyes and saw Li Qing, he was stunned, and the guide officer next to him immediately said: "Captain Xiang, this general is our new governor of Shazhou, General Yunlu Li!" ”

As soon as the words fell, the surroundings immediately fell to their knees, the Tang army had strict military discipline and attached great importance to the concept of hierarchy, and when the lieutenant heard that it was the Governor who had arrived, he immediately knelt down and saluted: "The last general, Xiang Xuan, the commander of the Doulu Army, the scout of Guoyi, see Lord Governor." ”

"Get up! Get up! Everybody get up. ”

Li Qing helped the sturdy Guoyi Lieutenant up, looked him up and down, and saw that his skin was dark, dark and shiny, although his appearance was honest and honest, but his eyes looked a little cunning, and he secretly thought: "I'm afraid that I can't ask him anything!" ”

"General Xiang, how many military camps does the Doulu Army have?"

Xiang Xuan immediately straightened up and said, "Back to the governor, there is only one military camp in the Doulu army." ”

Li Qing nodded, and said, "How many soldiers are there?" ”

As soon as these words came out, the corners of Xiang Xuan's eyes immediately twitched, and Ai Ai said: "Now there are only more than 1,200 people? ”

"What?"

Li Qing's pupils narrowed sharply, "There are more than 1,200 people, what about the 4,000 people mentioned in the delivery letter of the Ministry of War?" ”

Xiang Xuan, the commander of Guoyi, seemed to know Li Qing's thoughts, and continued: "Last year, there were 4,000 people, but after the former Ma Du Du stepped down at the beginning of the year, the brothers were transferred away one after another, and his subordinates did not know the specific reason. ”

"Who knows?" Li Qing tried not to show his face.

"That's what you have to ask Cao. After all, they are in charge of the specific military affairs. ”

Li Qing smiled kindly, patted him on the shoulder and said, "You continue to eat!" Go and tell the other officers above Lieutenant Guo Yi that I will have a drink tonight, and everyone must appreciate their faces. "He forgot that the governors were going to invite him to dinner tonight.

The former governor of Shazhou had retired at the beginning of the year, and had been in charge of the reign of Emperor Fu Wei Ming of Longyou and Hexi Jiedu, and Huang Fu Wei Ming did not care about specific military affairs, so Cao took turns to handle peacetime military affairs for the time being. Cao is an official, only responsible for the military affairs of the counselor, and the specific training of leading troops is carried out by the generals, and the one on duty today is Hu Cao to participate in the military, and when Li Qing arrived in Dunhuang County, he did not go to greet him.

Tocao is a man in his forties. surnamed Liu, sleepy all day long, as if stealing Taishang Laojun's sleepy worm, he had just eaten, was lying on the bookcase and fell asleep, and ordered the soldiers to wake him up.

"The new Governor is here!"

The sleepy insect was so frightened that he flew back to the Tushi Palace, Liu joined the army and expelled Ling Ling with a cold shiver, and immediately sobered up, and the curtain was raised.

Li Qing was surrounded by soldiers and strode in.

Liu Senjun hurriedly stepped forward. Bow down and salute, "Subordinate Cao Shen Military Liu Qilang See Li Dudu!" ”

Li Qing's face turned pale. Will the runes 'smack!' With a thud, he slammed into the table. Stared at him coldly and said: "Let me ask you, I have seen less than 1,000 soldiers since I entered the camp, but it is clearly written in the delivery letter of the military department, there should be 4,000 soldiers, even if there are sentry posts patrolling outside, but the gap should not be so big, where are the soldiers?" ”

He had almost decided that it was these Cao Zai who were doing the tricks. Otherwise, it would be impossible for the Ministry of War to fail to file a record.

The sweat on Liu Senjun's head had already come down, and he secretly complained. "How can you be on duty today?"

"Lord Governor, I. . .

"My surname is Lee"

"Yes! Be! Li Dudu, what the lower officials did was not long, this was done by the former governor, and the lower officials really don't know about this matter. ”

"Humph!" Li Qing sneered, "Since you don't want to tell me, then I'll write a recital, and you can go and explain it to the court and the emperor!" ”

After saying that, Li Qing turned around and left, Liu Shenjun immediately panicked, grabbed Li Qing and said mournfully: "Governor Li, please wait a moment!" ”

Li Qing stopped, but glanced at the hand he was holding his arm.

Liu Senjun was so frightened that he hurriedly stopped his hand, and bowed down again and again to apologize: "My subordinates have no intention of offending, and the governor will forgive me!" ”

"That's it, you can say it!"

Li Qing sat down on his position, and said with a smile on his face: "It's just that the secret between them can't be concealed at all, otherwise I will engage in military law!" ”

"That's it! That's it! ”

With a twist in his heart, he turned around and closed the door, walked to Li Qing's side, and whispered in his ear: "This matter was done by our Jiedu envoy, and he transferred the Doulu Army away privately. ”

"Transferred away?"

Li Qing's eyes gradually narrowed into a slit, "What do you mean by this?" ”

Seeing that he asked the vital point, Liu Senjun couldn't help but sigh and continued: "It's not easy to recruit soldiers in the Western Regions, and it's even more difficult to recruit soldiers with experience and combat effectiveness.

"So what?"

Li Qing saw that he was like squeezing toothpaste, and he didn't say anything if he didn't squeeze him, so he couldn't help but slap the table and said fiercely: "Say!" Don't stop, tell the truth to the governor of Pontus! ”

Liu Senjun was so frightened that his legs trembled, he wiped a handful of sweat, and said in a trembling voice: "So Lord Huangfu released all our Doulu army, and then turned them into his own soldiers, I also heard about this, I'm not sure, Li Dudu, don't say that this matter is what I said!" ”

Li Qing let out a long breath, no wonder the emperor saw that he was his own person, and he was so affectionate that he sent troops to escort him, no wonder Chu Zhilian's face was weird, it turned out to be because of this.

However, this matter is very important, how can he not report it to Li Longji, and suddenly a thought popped up in his heart, "Maybe Li Longji already knew about this matter." ’

The more he thought about it, the more likely it became, did he let the curtain come with him, just to know that there were no soldiers here?

"No, this matter will not be so simple, he must have a purpose for letting himself come to Shazhou."

Thinking about this, Li Qing felt as if he had fallen into a big conspiracy, but he didn't know what it was? Cold sweat broke out from Li Qing's back again.