On the tenth day of April 890, the industrial group jointly laid the first railway track in Yizhou's rail factory and construction company, announcing that the world's first mature railway was under construction. Li Xuanqing and his wife, Murong Hanhai, who was stranded in the local area, and other high-level officials of Tiance Mansion attended the groundbreaking ceremony. The vast scene of tens of thousands of people surrounded the railway, which was more than 200 miles long.

In this era, the power of the population is magnified without limits. With the assistance of more than 300 steel carriages mobilized by the industrial group in advance, the railroad tracks of the Yizhou plant were quickly transported to the construction site. After the master in charge of installation places the sleepers and rails at the specified distance, he uses rivets and new screws to fix the sleepers and rails, and extends them in the direction of Yingzhou one by one. On the other side, more than 100 people, with the assistance of more than a dozen war horses, dragged the heads of two trains slowly towards the construction site.

"Big brother, is the track system you set a wide gauge?" Qiaoxi looked at the railroad tracks that had been paved for more than ten zhang, took a step to measure the amount, and said with a smile: "Isn't the cost of this width a bit big?" ”

Li Xuanqing nodded, this rail system is set by himself, and five feet is basically the width of 1524 mm of wide gauge in later generations. In later generations, in the world's prevailing railway track standards, only the polar bear and nearby countries would use broad gauge.

"Although the cost of broad gauge is a little higher, the train is smooth and has no bumps, and the freight volume will increase a lot. That's not too much of a loss. Li Xuanqing said with a smile: "In the future, there will be no broad gauge and narrow gauge, and we will be the standard gauge." ”

Qiaoxi was laughed at by Li Xuanqing, and nodded indifferently, he took the lead, and he didn't care if there was a foot in the future. The two watched for a while and then prepared to go back. Anyway, coming to the scene is basically a face, so that Zhang Qiang and the others understand that the big boss attaches great importance to railway construction.

"Qiaoxi, wait a minute." Unprepared, Murong Feixue's voice came from behind him.

The two turned their heads and saw Murong Feixue hurriedly walking over with Xu Xingxia, who they hadn't seen for a long time. After seeing Li Xuanqing, Xu Xingxia was about to salute when he was stopped, "Xingxia, I heard that your family was suppressed by Yang Shouliang some time ago?" Is it big of an impact now? ”

Xu Xingxia is currently the only one of the five wealthy businessmen in Fengzhou whose ancestral residence is not in the jurisdiction of Tiance Mansion. Some time ago, Yang Shouliang didn't know which tendon was wrong and started to beat him, so he sent someone to arrest all the clansmen of the Jinzhou and Shangzhou generations of Xu Xingxia's ancestral home, and set a fire to make the Xu family's ancestral house less polished. Although Xu Xingxia basically transferred important resources and family members to Fengzhou and Chang'an in recent years, the ancestral house was burned in this era, which hit the Xu family hard. Xu Xingxia once asked Xuan Yingwei for help in order to save his clan, but when the person in charge of the Dragon Group's activities in Shannan Province arrived, Xu Xingxia summoned him and said that he had already talked to Yang Shouliang.

"Thank you for your concern, I lost a sum of money, and I gave Yang Shouliang a gift, and finally rescued the clansmen." Xu Xingxia smiled bitterly: "Actually, Yang Shouliang is not suppressed for no reason, because some time ago, our Xu family was preparing a secret matter, because Yang Shouliang was aware of it, so he was detained so many clansmen?" ”

"What is it that is a secret matter that has attracted such a big repression? Now the whole world knows the identity of our five wealthy businessmen? Murong Feixue on the side asked a little puzzled.

"My lord, let's find a place to sit down, and Xingxia will talk to you slowly. Xingxia has been preparing for this for nearly half a year. Until recently, it was barely completed. Xu Xingxia took Li Xuanqing and his entourage to an office in the steel plant, sat down and said: "My lord, Xingxia has secretly collected a group of shipwrights, seafarers and sailors during this time. ”

As soon as his words were finished, Li Xuanqing and Qiaoxi almost screamed in surprise. Qiaoxi even covered her mouth and said, "Brother Xu, why did you suddenly remember to sail?" ”

"Xingxia, have you ever been to Lingnan?" However, Li Xuanqing pondered for a long time, and suddenly remembered something and asked, "Tell me how the situation is in Lingnan now?" ”

"Sure enough, I can't hide anything from my lord." Xu Xingxia said with a little emotion: "A few years ago, because of business, Xingxia got acquainted with a Lingnan businessman surnamed Ma, who was from Chaozhou. This person made an extraordinary move, and he bought a large number of silk, white marble, porcelain and other commodities of our Tiance Mansion from me at one time. Xingxia saw that a lot of the silver he gave was not silver ingots from our Middle-earth, but silver coins, so he hurried over. Only then did I know that Chaozhou, Guangzhou and other places that were destroyed by the Huangchao Rebellion have gradually recovered their vitality, and the sea route has gradually reopened over the years. Therefore, Xingxia recruited more than 300 crew members in Guangzhou, and some of the technicians returned to Shangzhou, preparing to test it in the Yangtze River first, but Yang Shouliang mistakenly thought that the shipbuilding should be connected to the Tiance army. ”

"You mean that Guangzhou has been restored?" Li Xuanqing was a little surprised. Even Qiaoxi next to him became nervous with this sentence. There was a Tang Dynasty, and foreign trade in Guangzhou was already booming, and there were still many Fanbang people living near Guangzhou, and even one-third of the permanent residents of Guangzhou were not Tang people. It can only be Huangchao in the sixth year of Qianfu to capture Fuzhou and Guangzhou successively. The important town of Lingnan was destroyed in this battle, and tens of thousands of people from Fanbang died, which also completely destroyed the vitality of Lingnan people to forge ahead and sail away.

"It's partially restored, but it's still less than a tenth of what it was in its heyday. Moreover, Liu Qian and Lu Guangmu, who occupied Guangzhou and other places, were also unpopular, expropriating and expropriating, the people lived in difficulty, and the merchants were also heavily taxed. Xu Xingxia shook his head and sighed.

"Brother Xu, are you planning to form a long-distance fleet by yourself?" Li Xuanqing's face kept changing, and Qiaoxi next to him suddenly remembered Xu Xingxia's words before, so he took over the conversation and asked.

"Xingxia has this intention. In fact, my Xu family has a clan scattered in Hangzhou and Yuezhou, with sailing experience, and this trek for more than half a year has also found this clan, ready to reopen the voyage business. Xu Xingxia nodded.

"Since Brother Xu is preparing to sail away, I wonder if the ship is ready?" Qiao Xi smiled and said. I don't have much interest in sailing Qiaoxi, especially Li Xuanqing's identity is becoming more and more important now, and it is not a big problem to go around on land, but once he goes to sea, Qiaoxi can't imagine it. Since Li Xuanqing can't go to sea, Qiaoxi has little interest in going to sea. However, for his own shipyard, Qiaoxi didn't want to let go of Xu Xingxia, a big customer.

When Qiaoxi was thinking about how to attract customers, Hu Xiaosi in the north had already started his own plan. After a meeting of all the personnel of the Xuanying Guard Prairie Branch, these personnel were selected from the Tahi tribe and began to arrange these things in a hurry.

At this time, Yelu Abaoji had already led the most elite royal court guards of the Khitan to quietly lurk in the southern tribal alliance for more than a hundred miles. and secretly sent people to contact their own internal contacts to listen to the dynamics of the Southern Alliance. According to Yelu Hanxiong's plan, as long as the main forces of these tribal armies leave the tribe and go to Danzhou to face the Tiance army, they will take immediate action and take down the head of the tribal alliance led by the Bandan Department in one fell swoop, so that they can fundamentally remove the dissident forces within the Khitan and complete the integration of the tribes. Then, according to the development of the front-line situation, the follow-up action against the Han land was decided. If the Han people continue to be strong, then they will carry out the original plan, and if the Han people decline, they can use the forces of the southern tribal alliance to occupy Youzhou and other places in the south, as an outpost in and out of the Central Plains.

However, in Yelu Hanxiong's heart, the minority groups of the Murwei and Khitan people in the north have always been his confidants, and if he can't unify these places, he will have to sleep with one eye open.

It can be said that Yelu Hanxiong's plan is almost seamless, in order not to alert several tribes such as Bandan, Yelu Hanxiong has even set off to Longhua Prefecture in the north to start deploying military divisions against the Huangtou Murowei people.

After listening to his subordinates' reports on these specific situations, Hu Xiaosi smiled slightly, glanced at the sky in the north, and said with a smile: "I heard that Abaoji is a rising star of the Yelu tribe, and he is very strategic at a young age, so let's let him and Wandan beat themselves by themselves." After a pause, he continued: "Wei Ran, go and execute the plan immediately." Isn't the eldest son of the Banten tribe on good terms with you? I'll leave this matter to you, by the way, it's a little bit like a trick. ”

A young man dressed in Khitan costume beside Hu Xiaosi bowed down to answer the order, and his accent actually had a strong flavor of Hu language. This is Wei Ran, the head of the grassland branch, and Tahi's brother-in-law, who has been in the grassland for more than a year, and this change in the southern tribe is what he discovered.

After Hu Xiaosi arranged this, he called Su Xiaohu to his side, and the two of them muttered sneakily for a long time before Su Xiaohu left quickly with a lewd face.

"Immediately fly to send three shots to Danzhou and the group army headquarters to summon the news, and everything is going according to plan. The time is set for a month later. Let Li San of Danzhou find a way to delay the other party for half a month. After Hu Xiaosi sent Su Xiaohu away, he took a deep breath and began to send a message to the rear.

The drastic changes in the grasslands were even hinted at on the southern front of Tiance Mansion. After confronting the Tiance army along the lower reaches of the Yellow River, the Xuanwu army began to restrict the people who could enter the area under the jurisdiction of Tiance Prefecture within their own borders. and imposed heavy taxes on past merchants, and even arrested a group of businessmen in the jurisdiction of Tiance Prefecture on charges of spies.

This kind of change made Biao Zi and Zhao Si, who had just arrived in Bianzhou, stunned for a moment, and then understood that this should be the Xuanwu Army to attract the attention of the south of the Tiance Army, and it may even attract the main attention of the Tiance Army, so as to relax their attention to the north.

After thinking about this, these two bold guys decided to carry out the craziest plan in Hu Xiaosi's absence, and worked together. Zhao Si led the dragon group and the secret guards to continue to carry out the previous plan to disrupt the economic foundation of Bianliang, and Biao Zi took some people to start connecting with Zhu Quanzhong's mansion, and according to Hu Xiaosi's explanation before leaving, the portraits of Zhu Youqi and Zhu Youshu's wife and concubine were secretly placed in Zhu Quanzhong's bedroom. and began to design for the wives of the two to spend more time with Zhu Quanzhong. In order to make this play perfect, Biao Zi secretly obtained a very strange medicinal fragrance from a merchant from the Western Regions, and began to distribute it to Zhu Quanzhong's father and son's room intentionally or unintentionally. This rosemary-like substance can be inhaled to promote blood circulation, soothing the body and mind, and creating an illusion in the mind that is different from the previous incense. This very strange and slight hallucination has almost no meaning from a single effect, but it can't stand this guy from ordering this kind of thing to the bedroom of Zhu Quanzhong's father and son every day.

Biao Zi thought that the merchant from the Western Regions had described the dependence that would arise after absorbing too much incense, and suddenly laughed, what he used for Zhu Quanzhong and his son was not the same type. But the smell of his two daughters-in-law, who often appear in front of Zhu Quanzhong, can be-

Before Biaozi could imagine this kind of scene, the secret guard outside hurriedly sent the latest information.

Biaozi took it and glanced at it hurriedly and nodded, but his face became serious, and he stood at the window and pondered for a long time before he began to go out.

Just after Biaozi went out, he hurriedly came out of Bianzhou with his men and horses, and headed in the direction of Luoyang, the eastern capital. And as soon as he left the city, the old rival Zheng Fan appeared with someone in the place where Biaozi was staying before. But it's a pity that it's still one step short and a pounce.

This situation did not discourage Zheng Fan, but he was relieved, at least this time he had touched the other party's rules.

Biaozi's departure did not relax that plan in the slightest, but after arriving in Luoyang, he began to hit the idea on His Majesty the Emperor, and with the appearance of Biaozi, the Zhaozong Emperor, who had finally been stable in Luoyang for half a year, suddenly sneezed.

The secret war between the north and south lines gradually reached a climax in the wave after wave of contests, and at this time, Li Xuanqing was always paying attention to the progress of the northern railway. After arranging for Xu Xingxia to rush to Yingzhou, he began to think about the layout of the Bohai Bay railway network. Yingzhou at the end of the Tang Dynasty was different from other eras. At this time, the Yingzhou that Li Xuanqing was referring to was the area from Changli in Hebei Province to the east to the sea. It is to put Changli and the eastern part of the land under the jurisdiction of Yingzhou. And most of the Yingzhou that is familiar to history is still in the hands of the Khitans, and in view of this, the imperial court will change Guangning to Yingzhou at the end of the Tang Dynasty.

As time passed, by the end of April, the railway line from Yizhou to Yingzhou was almost completed. The single line of more than 200 miles of railway was finally about to be completed in this era.

"Big brother, basically it will be open to traffic this month." Qiaoxi took the notice sent by Zhang Qiang and smiled, stepped forward to look at Li Xuanqing's contemplative expression, and his thoughts seemed to have gone somewhere else.

At this time, outside the city of Danzhou, the army of the Khitans also quietly appeared. Li San stood on the city tower, but quietly breathed a sigh of relief, and with a wave of his big hand, the soldiers of the Tiance Army behind him began to prepare.

Almost at the same time, Chen Fan in a certain part of the grassland also began to gather all the intelligence officers together, but issued only one order, that is, to rush to Zhongjing in five days.

On April 29, 890 AD, Li Xuanqing and Qiaoxi took the Fuxing train from Yizhou to Yingzhou. Under the billowing plume of smoke, a long steel dragon began to slowly move forward with a rumbling sound. This scene also surprised all the people around and brought an unprecedented storm, and the concept of a thousand years of silence was pried open little by little in this roar.