It was windy and cold, and there was no one else on deck except for a few of the ship's crewmen, and the air was filled with a heavy smell of mud, and debris splashed by the crash of the waves against the side of the ship.

Li Mao walked onto the deck, and when the wind blew, he couldn't help but shiver. He looked at the gray sky, felt that there was nothing to see, and was about to go back to the cabin, when his eyes suddenly lit up, but he saw Tian Qian leaning on the side of the boat looking at the turbid river.

Her thin figure looked very thin under the empty turbidity waves, Li Mao hesitated for a moment, but still walked over.

"People say that if you don't see the Yellow River, you won't die, and if you don't see the coffin, you won't cry, this river is really a fierce river."

Tian Qian was looking at the river intently, immersed in her own world, suddenly heard this, taken aback, she looked up at Li Mao, smiled reluctantly, it was a greeting, her eyes slipped down the river again, and replied lightly: "This is the only season in the year, most of the time, she is still very beautiful." Li Mao said: "Yes, if she is so violent all year round, she will not be called the mother river." ”

"Mother River? Brother Li compares the Yellow River to the mother river, which is a very apt analogy. ”

Li Mao said with a smile: "I'm just picking up people's teeth, I'm a monk, I am a monk, I haven't read for a few years, I don't know what metaphors to compare, I can't compare to you." Tian Qi smiled and said, "Me? What do I have? Li Mao said: "Brother Guantian's demeanor and conversation are full of elegance, which shows that he is knowledgeable. Tian Qian smiled slightly, and replied modestly: "Brother Li has a good reputation, my father is a good and elegant person, and he has hired a strict teacher to supervise him since he was a child, and I just know a little bit about the etiquette of treating people." ”

Li Mao smiled, didn't ask any more, several times and three times, this woman named Tian Qian refused to reveal the slightest bit of family identity, Pingshui met, he had no reason to continue to chase. Regardless of family background, Li Mao took the Yellow River as a topic and chatted with her from all over the world, which was very speculative for a while.

Tian Qian is not only greeting, but also has a very broad vision, and often has a unique way of seeing people and things. As for Li Mao, that horizon is naturally open and boundless, starting from Hongmeng's groundbreaking, up and down for 5,000 years, ancient and modern Chinese and foreign affairs, and talking with relish. Tian Xuan, who has always been reserved, unconsciously showed her true temperament, her eyes were wide open, her eyes were shining, and she covered her mouth and giggled. These things Li Mao said sound grotesque, but when you think about it, there is a certain amount of truth.

If he hadn't shown his experience as a monk early on, Tian Qian would have regarded him as a demon. Monks, you don't have to be busy for your livelihood, you don't have to think about passing on your ancestry, you don't have to work for the welfare of future generations, isn't being idle and bored just pondering these strange things all day long?

Tian Qi was very beautiful when she laughed, and her beautiful eyes were as clear as water.

The two Qingmo got out of the cabin noisily, and the female Qingmo saw Tian Qian chatting with Li Mao, so she angrily said at Qingmo: "How can I say, our eldest man was hooked out by your family, and you still don't admit it, what's the matter, let's arrest it." As she spoke, she raised her little head proudly, rushed to Tian Xuan, and scolded sharply: "It's so cold outside, how can you eat, why don't you go back with me quickly." ”

She grabbed Tian Qing's arm and walked away without saying anything. Tian Qian was like a child who had done something wrong, so she lowered her head and followed her without saying a word. After the two left, Qingmo pulled Li Mao and said, "It's amazing, this Tian Gongzi has a lot of background!" The kid just now couldn't find him in a hurry, so he was anxious, and shouted for me to hand over someone, I said it's really strange, Tian Gongzi's feet grow on his own legs, where to go, can I care. He didn't follow, and said ruthlessly that if he didn't hand over people, he would arrest us and send us to prison. I said you heard clearly, our Dalang is the seven-grade county order of the imperial court, who dares to be presumptuous! Guess what he said, he said, 'Phew, what is the county order?', my son-in-law's father is a soldier and horse envoy in Wei Bo's backyard, holding tens of thousands of soldiers and horses, who is powerful? ”

Li Mao gasped, and secretly said that she was really a real person who did not show her face, and she was not a real person, and she had long seen that she had an extraordinary background, but she didn't expect that she was actually the queen of the Pinglu Tian clan. The Tian clan is a big family in the world, and there are three lines with the most popularity, the Pinglu Tian clan, the Jingzhao Tian clan and the Xindu Tian clan. The Pinglu Tian clan has been operating the seven states of Weibo since Tian Chenghei, and the monopoly of the Jiedu envoy has been in the position for three generations, and the father is dead and the son is inherited, and the imperial court has no right to interfere.

Tian Chenghei, a native of Lulong, Pingzhou, was originally a general under An Lushan, participated in the Anshi Rebellion, and later surrendered to the Tang Dynasty in Mozhou, served as the envoy of Wei Bojiedu, occupied Wei, Bo, Xiang, Wei, Wei, Bei, Lan and other seven states, divided the locality, did not obey the orders of the imperial court, the imperial court repeatedly disagreed, and had to acquiesce in the fact that it was dividing the locality. Tian Chenghei's official residence was in Pingzhangshi, he was named the king of Yanmen County, and passed the throne to his nephew Tian Yue on his deathbed, which was a precedent for the hereditary feudal town after the Tang Dynasty.

Later generations talk about the feudal towns after the Middle and Tang Dynasty, and often associate them with the word "separation", saying that the feudal towns must say that they will be divided, and it seems that the feudal towns will inevitably be divided into places, and those that do not divide the places are not worthy of being called feudal towns.

Li Mao also had this impression before, but the facts after the crossing told him that this impression was one-sided. After the middle of the Tang Dynasty, there were many local feudal towns, and Henan, Hebei, Jingxi, Jingbei, Hedong, Southwest and other places were even more knotty to make flowers everywhere. However, not all feudal towns were divided into one side, at least in the Middle Tang Dynasty, most of them were still under the control of the imperial court.

At the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, there were only two levels of administrative regions at the state and county levels, and Xuanzong set up ten supervision areas, and set up nine section envoys on the back edge to control the garrison and manage local financial and political affairs, which was the prototype of the feudal town. After the Anshi Rebellion, whether it was the frontier or the interior, feudal towns bloomed everywhere, most of which governed more than ten states, and less than one state.

The name of the governor of the feudal town varies, but the Observation Envoy is the most common, the Observation Envoy also serves as the Assassin of the Shouzhou Prefecture, supervising the administration and finance of other prefectures and counties within its jurisdiction, and the Observation Envoy also serves as the envoy of the internal camp, branch, economic strategy, solicitation, pacification, and detention of the feudal domain, and manages the affairs of local civil affairs, finance, public security, and camping, and has become a first-level institution above the prefecture and county.

In addition, the imperial court set up jiedu envoys at important military nodes in the frontier and inland to control the local garrison. The Jiedu envoy has the Jieyue granted by the imperial court, and has the right to kill the local garrison, and the power is extremely heavy and the status is very high.

In the feudal towns with the Jiedu envoys, the Jiedu envoys concurrently serve as the observers, camps, branches, strategies, solicitations, pacification, and feudal envoys in the area under their jurisdiction, and integrate military, political, and financial powers.

Due to the high degree of centralization of power, some ambitious temperance envoys often withheld taxes to raise the army, and raised the army to gain self-respect, and disobeyed the decrees of the imperial court to seek local and private interests. But on the other hand, they were heavily dependent on the imperial court, and without the legitimacy conferred by the imperial court, they could not move an inch in the feudal towns. In western Beijing, northern Beijing and other places, because of the local poverty, the financial income could not make ends meet, and most of the military and administrative expenses of the feudal towns depended on the imperial court.

For this reason, the appointment and dismissal of the envoys of these feudal towns (observation envoys, economic envoys, capital protectors, etc.) were decided by the imperial court, and the state and county officials were also selected by the imperial court.

In most parts of the south, the imperial court was still able to do the feudal towns and their prefectures and counties, and the abolition of the jiedu envoy or the observation envoy depended entirely on the official documents of the imperial court.

However, due to historical and practical reasons, there were also some feudal towns that formed a de facto state of independence, and they supported their own troops, divided the localities, monopolized the abolition of the envoys and the appointment and dismissal of state and county officials, withheld taxes and were self-sufficient, and violated the imperial edicts, and even openly confronted them.

These feudal towns were called "arrogant domains", (arrogant means arrogant) and they were mainly concentrated in the Heshuo area (today's Hebei, Shandong, Beijing-Tianjin), with the three towns of Weibo, Chengde and Youzhou as typical representatives.

Although the Anshi Rebellion has been quelled for 40 years, the remnants of the rebels who rebelled in that year have not been cleared. After the Anshi Rebellion, the Tang Dynasty was weakened and adopted a strategy of appeasement and connivance with the localities, in order to maintain the nominal vassal relationship.

Over time, the local forces became stronger, and they formed alliances with each other, agreed not to invade each other, and united against the central government, and within the feudal towns, they abolished the Jiedu envoys on their own, did not report their household registration, withheld taxes from prefectures and counties, raised troops and divided the localities, and even appointed and dismissed officials on their own, and implemented local autonomy, becoming a de facto independent kingdom.

The backyard army is the elite of the tooth army, and the tooth army is the personal soldier of the festival, and the military and political power of Wei Bo is now in the hands of the Pinglu Tian clan, and Tian Qi's father is really the soldier and horse envoy in Wei Bo's backyard, so he must be Tian Chenghei's family.