The most fierce reaction was Li Kui, Li Kui jumped up directly from his seat and said: "Brother, I don't have many soldiers, as long as fifty people, I cut down all these birdmen, and the grass fell to our door, isn't it fat." ”

Liu Tang said: "Shuibo Liangshan is our foundation, the lifeblood of the shipping route, once the waterway grass is formed on a scale, the waterway will be blocked, and then our newly emerging business will be over." ”

Chao Zhang and Chao Ran also asked for battle.

Wu Yong touched his mustache without squeaking, and Chao Gai's face sank like water. Jiao Ting is a stuffy gourd who doesn't talk much, Wang Jin is a person who has been an officer after all, and said: "Why did the thief choose this Shuibo Liangshan and the grass, here is next to Jeju Mansion, Dongping Mansion, Yanju Mansion, and even not far from Tokyo, wouldn't it be easy to be exterminated." ”

Chao Gai said: "Wang Jiaotou just came, I don't know the inside story, let's look at the map." ”

The soldier pulled open the huge map hanging on the wall, the hand-drawn map was not too detailed, but it was generally clear. Wu Yong took a bamboo stick and pointed to the map: "Shuibo Liangshan has been formed for nearly a hundred years, from the five dynasties the Yellow River has burst its banks several times, and the water surrounds Liangshan, forming this east and west length of more than 170 li, north and south width of more than 80 li, the harbor is full of thousands of reeds, and water birds are everywhere. There are three big mountains in this water pool, Liangshan is the largest, Qinglong Mountain and Baihu Mountain are second. In particular, 10,000 acres of fertile land on Liangshan Island are very suitable for farming and growing grain, Qinglong Mountain and Baihu Mountain are overgrown with all kinds of trees, and there are thousands of acres of flat land, but in recent decades, water thieves have repeatedly gathered on the island to rob houses, so the village is completely deserted. The government did not allow people to live on the island, and the three large islands are still empty until now. If there are three or five hundred people, there will be enough strength to gain a foothold on these three islands, and it will be difficult to achieve it if you want to destroy them without several times the number of troops. ”

Chao Gai said: "It's only a hundred or ten people, first investigate the situation and then move on to the next step." ”

After the meeting, everyone went to work on their own affairs, Wang Jin was in a special situation, his identity was kept secret, and he only said that it was Wang Jun and Wang Jiaotou. The head of the Wang sect did not care about the military affairs, and single-mindedly instructed the leaders to lead the spears and horses in battle.

Everyone dispersed, and Wu Yong said: "Brother, this trip has been delayed for almost a month, and I have something to do in a hurry." ”

"Oh, what's that?" Chao Gai asked.

"Two things, the first one is Hu Sanniang you met last time, it seems to mean something to you. The second thing is that Li Kui gave a gift to the big black girl Hu Sanniang in person. Wu Yong said.

Chao Gai said: "What do you think?" ”

"Send people to propose relatives, and by the way, unite to form a huge fleet, with strong inland waterway transportation capacity and maritime trade capacity. We all know that this ship is the most economical and the largest volume, but it is actually slow, and it takes a month to go to Tokyo normally, and three months to go to Goryeo, Fuso and other countries. Therefore, the fleet must be formed as soon as possible, otherwise our soldiers will have something to feed. Wu Yongdao.

Chao Gai remembered Hu Sanniang's beautiful face, and it was better to marry him than to cheapen Wang Ying's goods. What's more, time waits for no one, and the development of maritime commerce is already an urgent matter.

Chao Gai asked people to call Li Kui again, and Chao Gai asked: "Li Kui, how about telling you a daughter-in-law." ”

Li Kui shook his head: "I am a good man, not close to women." ”

"Alright, you can go back. I was going to introduce Hu Sanniang's big black girl to you, but since you don't want to, forget it. Chao Gai said.

Li Kui scratched his head: "It's her, I don't know if he can take a fancy to me?" Li Kui's face was shy and twisted, which was indescribably funny compared to the usually rough Li Kui.

Wu Yong said: "If you can't look at it, you can try it in the past." ”

Li Kui said happily: "I'll go home, I'll go home." ”

"Why are you going home?" Chao Gai asked.

"I'll go home and get the money, I will hide all the money in my mother's place, and my mother won't let me drink indiscriminately." Li Kui said.

Chao Gai said: "The eight characters haven't been skimmed yet, you panic or something, let Mr. Wu go to explore the letter first, if people have that meaning, then go to propose, if there is no meaning, the matter will be closed." ”

"Hehe, I know, I'm going to train." Li Kui is gone.

Chao Gai also went back to discuss with Chao Xun, Chao Gai's parents have long passed away, although Chao Xun is a housekeeper, but Chao Gai has always regarded him as a father, and he still has to talk about such a big thing as a parent.

In the past few days, Chao Xun and Liu Liang have been busy preparing for the sale of tea, silk, spices and other important materials to Daliao and Dajin, and have set up a tannery to specialize in processing animal skins and furs for making shoes, winter clothes, cowhide armor and other important materials. At this time, Dajin had not yet been founded, and the tribe was known as Dajin, which actually controlled the eastern half of the Liao State, which is now most of the three northeastern provinces.

"The owner is back, a few days ago Liu Youtian said that 3,000 acres of Tianwang rice is growing well, it is already a foot high, and there are special personnel to patrol and maintain safety every day, but there are some small insects in Tianwang cotton, but the problem is not big, peanuts and Chaotian pepper grow normally, there is no problem." Chao Xun said.

Chao Gai said: "It's good that everything is normal, but I came over today to discuss something with Uncle Xun, I went to Dongping Mansion in January and rescued a woman in Lashan, called Hu Sanniang, who is the daughter of the owner of Hujiazhuang under the jurisdiction of Dongping Mansion, and she is also dignified and beautiful." Wu Yong proposed that if she wanted to go over to find out, if she was interested, she would go to propose marriage on my behalf. ”

Chao Xun smiled: "Good thing, good thing, you are already in your twenties, and the children of people of the same age as you are in their teens, and you should also get married." You don't have to play tricks on this kid when you arrange for Wu Yong, it's important to be sincere, and you can't save any of the etiquette you should have. Chao Xun arranged a lot of them, Chao Gai agreed again and again, asked people to prepare gifts, and arranged for Wu Yong to bring Chao Ran to lead fifty people as guards to Hujiazhuang to propose relatives.

Let's say that on the island of Liangshan Mountain, dozens of thatched lawns have been built between the broken walls, and hundreds of people are in rags and holding weapons. The leader is actually a Xiucai wearing scribe clothes, surnamed Wang Minglun, with a nickname called Baiyi Xiushi, his hometown was originally from Langya, Yizhou, and his ancestors have also been celebrities. This Wang Lun writes well, and his studies are also profound, but his family is poor, and he has entered Beijing several times to catch the exam, which is the end of his name Sun Shan. In a fit of anger, he no longer took the merit test and befriended the heroes of the rivers and lakes, Du Qian and Song Wan, so the three of them discussed that they wanted to occupy a hill and fall into the grass, and it was not easy to fall into the grass, this thing was like opening a commercial house, there must be the first batch of start-up capital, and there must be knives, guns and weapons, these are not things that Wang Lun can solve, but Wang Lun is not angry.

A group of three people went from Tokyo to Henghai County, Cangzhou, and found Chai Jin, who was known as Little Meng. It is not false that Chai Jin is rich, and it is not false to help people in the rivers and lakes, but most of them are ten taels of silver, and it will be difficult to have more, and Chai Jin will not pay more money without ten points.

Wang Lun and Chai Jin talked heart-to-heart, just the location of this grass fell to make Chai Jin look at Wang Lun differently, eight hundred miles of water in Liangshan, the surrounding vast and mighty water is full of water, the port is vertical and horizontal, can advance and retreat, can fight and run. What's more, Wang Lun grasped the biggest weakness of the official family, and there was almost no inland river army in the north. Chai Jin was also generous, and gave Wang Lun two thousand taels of silver and one hundred Pu knives.

Wang Lun and the other three recruited more than 100 people along the road, avoided the big prefectures and counties, and cautiously came to Shuibo Liangshan. With this amount of manpower and money, when the cottage is up, you will have everything after a few votes.

"Du Qian, Song Wan, tomorrow I will arrange for someone to recruit some strong men nearby, start building passes, recruit carpenters, and build a few fast boats, the speed of the canopy boat is too slow." Wang Lun commanded.

Du Qian was a little worried, and said: "I heard that there is a very good guy named Chao Gai near here, and he has trained a village soldier, so we have to be careful." ”

Wang Lun thought deeply and said: "From today onwards, the three of us will divide the minions into three groups to take turns on duty, and we can only relax when the pass is completed." ”

Song Wandao: "I will go out tomorrow to look for the people who can't get by, the people are miserable these days, and there are many people who are willing to fall into the grass." ”

"Okay, that's the division of labor, I'm responsible for supervising the construction of the wall, Du Qian is responsible for training minions, and Song Wango is responsible for recruiting minions. But there are talents who must be recruited to the mountain to make a strong reputation. Wang Lun said.

When the three of them were making their first development plan, they suddenly heard someone say in a loud voice: "Don't be so troublesome, you won't be able to get through today." ”

Wang Lun, Du Qian, and Song Wan were shocked, and they saw dozens of people walking in stride, and one of them was tall, with a mighty face, and a halberd painted by Fang Tian. There are two big men on the left, one with a large scar on his face and an hateful face, and the other with a face as black as the bottom of a pot, holding a pair of plate axes. There are also two big men on the right, one holding a long knife, the other holding a reed leaf gun, and more than fifty people behind them all holding war bows and waist knives hanging from their waists. It was none other than others, it was Chao Gai, Li Kui, Jiao Ting, Ruan Xiaowu, and Kong Yang who were the leaders. There is also Ruan Xiaoqi's fleet on the water.

"Put, sentry brother." Du Qian was startled and speechless for a moment.

Ruan Xiaowu said: "Your sentry brothers are sleeping, my brother is kind-hearted and soft-faced, and he can't bear to kill more, otherwise he will be killed." ”

Wang Lun calmed down his excitement, and immediately stabilized his mind and asked, "Who is Your Excellency, and why did you break into my Liangshan Village." ”

"You Wang Lun are smart people, you can't guess who I am?" Chao Gai laughed.

"You are Chao Gai, Chao Tuanlian, what are you doing here?" Wang Lundao.

"Exactly, you group of people are so unreasonable, I just worked hard to clean up the water bandit flies in Shuibo Liangshan a month ago, and your batch of flies are here again." Chao Gai said.

Wang Lun didn't dare to move when he saw his minions in Chaogai, although he was a little unwilling, but he was helpless, and the arrogance of the scholar was still a little bit.

"Chao Tuan has practiced his courage and treated the water bandits and bandits as flies, but do you know that flies are beaten and born, can you beat them?" Wang Lundao.

Chao Gai smiled: "Sit, let's talk, these two tall men, one is called Du Qian, the other is called Song Wan, they are also sitting, don't stand, it's like a tree trunk." ”