Although Liang Qing was dissolute, he didn't dare to be vague about major things, Tong Guan actually wanted to join forces with his father, such a major matter made Liang Qing dare not delay for a moment, and after coming out of the alum tower, he hurried back to the mansion. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

Liang Shicheng went to bed very early at night, usually he would go to bed to rest, and get up early the next day, at this time, in the living room, two maids were helping Liang Shicheng burn his feet, and a little eunuch ran to the door and bowed down to report: "The little official is back, saying that there is something important to report to the master!" ”

Liang Shicheng was about to tell him to talk about it tomorrow, but when he thought about it, it was impossible for his son not to know his living habits, and there must be something big when he came to find him at this time, so Liang Shicheng said: "Let him wait in the study!" ”

The little eunuch hurriedly went back, and the two maids carefully dried Liang Shicheng's feet with dry cloths, and then he slowly walked towards the study in soft boots.

Walking into the room, Liang Qing hurriedly stood up, Liang Shicheng waved his hand, "Sit down!" ”

Liang Shicheng is quite satisfied with this adopted son, although he used to be idle all day long, but since he entered the palace as a guard, he has restrained a lot, and he will do something for himself, the only fly in the ointment is that he is twenty-six or seventeen years old, and he has not yet married and had children, who will inherit his own fireworks? This point has always been haunting Liang Shicheng's heart.

"What's the matter?" Liang Shicheng sat down and asked.

Liang Qing didn't dare to sit down, stood beside her father with her hands down, and whispered, "Tong Youhei came to me tonight." ”

Liang Shicheng's eyelids jumped, Tong Youhei is the son of Tong Guan, could it be that Tong Guan is what's the matter?

Liang Qing took out the letter and handed it to his father, "This is a letter from Mrs. Tong to my father, and Tong Youhei asks the child to pass it on to his father." ”

Liang Shicheng took the letter, but he was not in a hurry to read it, put it aside, and squinted his eyes and asked, "What else did he say?" ”

What Mrs. Tong wanted to say was in the letter, but Tong Youhei chatted with the child for a long time.

"What are you talking about?"

"Let's talk about the Northern Expedition, Tong Yousi is very interested in this aspect."

Liang Qing accepted eighteen pearls, and he didn't dare to say that he had leaked his father's usual remarks.

"Northern Expedition?"

Liang Shicheng snorted disdainfully, "What do you know about the Northern Expedition?" ”

At this time, the maid came into the house to bring a cup of warm water to Liang Shicheng, before going to bed, Liang Shicheng never drank tea, that would affect sleep, he only drank the spring water sent from Luming Mountain, eighty miles to the south, the water quality in Bianjing was not good, and the upper class of society drank the spring water in the mountain.

Liang Shicheng took a sip of water, and then opened Tong Guan's letter and read it carefully.

Tong Guan recalled the past when they were young in the letter, and apologized to him for two small things in the past, at the end of the letter, Tong Guan invited him to go out for spring together, although it was just a homely letter to talk about the old days, in Liang Shicheng still read the deep meaning of Tong Guan hidden between the lines.

Liang Shicheng smiled faintly, of course he asked Tong Guan for himself, Tong Guan's status in the eyes of the official family has declined, in the past two years, the official family has changed the name of the year, changing the political harmony to Chonghe, and changing the heavy harmony to Xuanhe, which reflects the urgent desire of the official family to make meritorious contributions and complete the great cause of the Northern Expedition that the ancestors have not been able to complete.

Although Tong Guan was actively preparing for war in the north in the past two years, he lacked effective communication with the official family, which led the official family to think that he was not enterprising, and Cai Jing and Li Yan provoked him in the middle, and the official family's dissatisfaction with him increased day by day.

But these are not the fundamental reasons, the fundamental reason is that Tong Guan and Cai Jing's power struggle is at a disadvantage, Tong Guan, as a privy envoy, is in charge of military power, but he has been staring at the power of government affairs, desperately trying to install his own people in the court, but he has done it so obviously, meddling in Taixue is his biggest failure, with Cai Jing's old scheming, how can he suffer this dumb loss!

From the beginning of the imperial examination, Cai Jing exerted his strength, Tong Guan single-mindedly cultivated three jinshi, two were demoted to the state school to teach, and one has not been awarded an official so far, but Tong Guan abandoned the most promising Li Yanqing, just because Li Yanqing refused to be his pawn to enter the household department as an official, Tong Guan repeatedly made stupid moves, how can he be undefeated?

Liang Shicheng paced back and forth with his hands down, he was thinking about how to respond to Tong Guan's joint proposal, it was absolutely impossible to go to the spring together, it would be too obvious to do so, and it would be hated by the officials, but Tong Guan's fish must be caught, let him use it for his own use, but if you want to catch Tong Guan's fish, you have to give a little bait appropriately.

Thinking of this, Liang Shicheng slowly said to Liang Qing: "You go and tell Tong Youhei, just say that I haven't been in good health recently, and it is not suitable to go out, thank him for his father's invitation, and tell Tong Youhei again, please tell him to tell his father that the official family thinks that Taixue is a place to study and learn, and it is not suitable to train in the military camp, so let him focus on the Northern Expedition!" Don't worry about learning too much. ”

"Remember, I'll go find the child's heir tomorrow!"

"In addition, you tell him that although the official family hopes that the Northern Expedition will succeed in two or three years, the DPRK and China may not be able to afford it, and as long as he works hard, whether he can succeed is another matter."

This is the bait released by Liang Shicheng, first reminding him to let go of Taixue and not to continue to disgust the Son of Heaven, and clearly told Tong Guan that the imperial treasury is empty, and the financial resources cannot support a large-scale battle at all, once the financial resources are not spent, it is Cai Jing's responsibility, and he believes that Tong Guan will understand what he means.

..........

In a blink of an eye, the time came to May of the first year of Xuanhe, and the weather gradually became hotter, but the preparations of the Northwest Army also began to accelerate, and at the same time, the Western Xia army also noticed the abnormal movement of the Song army, so it temporarily gave up the strategic plan of attacking Xijing of the Liao State and began to prepare for defense.

Li Yanqing has been in the Northwest Army for two months, he has long been adapted to his current post, for him, serving as the left chief to join the army is really a big and useless, every day is boring to review and approve, occasionally go to the warehouse to check, he feels that he is the warehouse supervisor, but Li Yanqing also knows that all kinds of strict systems are the guarantee of victory in the war, and the strict system is not effectively implemented is also a fictitious, and he is the executor of this system.

Many things will feel very simple just by looking at the surface, but if you really go deeper, you will find that things are not simple, and Li Yanqing feels this way.

His subordinates are not only engaged in more than a dozen of the three divisions, engaged in just doing things at the bottom of the civil officials, there are a large number of miscellaneous servants below, Li Yanqing finally deeply understood the severity of the redundant soldiers of the Great Song Dynasty, he is in charge of the third division of the left, the division of soldiers, division armor and division of cavalry, in addition to the directors of each division and five engaged, in addition to each division is also equipped with twenty miscellaneous soldiers, especially the division is in charge of the Northwest Army 6,000 war horses, in addition to the twenty miscellaneous soldiers in the harness warehouse, there are also stables responsible for the management of the Northwest Army, including sixty feeding horsemen and one hundred and twenty horsemen, Including veterinarians, nailers, blacksmiths, carpenters, coachmen, and other miscellaneous servants, but these soldiers are not forbidden troops, but local chamber troops.

Not only are there a lot of soldiers, but also the expenses are huge, among which the expenditure of war horses is the most, 6,000 war horses have to consume a lot of forage and black beans and other concentrate fodder every day, and all kinds of expenses every month reach more than 100,000 or even 200,000 yuan, once the war breaks out, the expenses are surging several times.

However, although the daily affairs are boring, he can often get the opportunity to travel, due to the need to prepare for war, they must set up many small military depots on the border, and regularly go to the small military depots around the country to conduct inventory and audit is their job, generally speaking, civilian officials are not willing to go to the border inspection, not only hard but also dangerous, easy to encounter the cross-border spies of the Western Xia army, so even if they give double the subsidy, everyone would rather stay in Taiyuan.

Li Yanqing likes this dangerous drudgery very much, and every time he will personally lead his men to patrol the border.

This time, however, they had to take stock not only of military expenditures, but also of the readiness of the various armies.

In the afternoon of this day, Li Yanqing arrived at Kehu Village of the Jinning Army with two engaged and six sergeants, Kehu Village is located on the east bank of the Yellow River, but it is not a border, and the border will continue to walk two hundred miles west after crossing the Yellow River, but Kehu Village is an important logistics place, and it also has a huge warehouse group, Kehu Village is located on high ground, stationed with 500 soldiers, led by a Marquis Yu.

When Li Yanqing and his entourage came to the gate, Yuhou Zhang Wei greeted him, hugged his fists and said with a smile: "Welcome to Li Join's army!" ”

Li Yanqing replied with a smile, "It's a routine, and I'm going to make trouble for Zhang Yuhou again." ”

Although Li Yanqing is only an eight-rank civil official, he holds the power of material distribution and is an out-and-out god of wealth in the army, and everyone knows that it is not wise to offend him, so Li Yanqing is respected by the generals of all armies wherever he goes.

Zhang Wei, Marquis of Yu, invited Li Yanqing and his entourage into Dazhai, Li Yanqing instructed him to take the soldiers to count the military resources, and he climbed the lookout, which is a wooden platform ten zhang high, standing on the high platform, you can clearly see the situation on the Yellow River.

On the way, he heard that there was heavy rain along the Yellow River, and the Yellow River was swollen, and it was very difficult to cross the Yellow River, which made him a little worried.

I saw that the turbid waves were rolling on the river, the wind was rushing and the waves were high, the big flags in the barracks were crackling, and the air was overcast, and it seemed that another heavy rain was coming.

At this time, Zhang Wei walked to Li Yanqing's side and said: "There is a saying in the northwest called 'the wind is urgent and there is no rain', this weather looks gloomy, in fact, it will not rain, you can use a large raft to cross the river, but I suggest that it is best not to go west during this time of joining the army!" ”

"Why?" Li Yanqing asked suspiciously.

"During this time, the spies of the Western Xia army are very rampant, and if there is no army to protect the westward journey, it is likely to be ambushed by the Western Xia spies, and there have been three ups and downs this month."

Li Yanqing smiled slightly and said, "How can you retreat when you hear the enemy in your own country?" ”