In the spring of the fourth year of the first peace, Liu Yuan was busy with one thing, the county and county planning matters controlled by the Xia State, so as to strengthen the system of the central government's control over local finances, as early as Meiji, Liu Yuan changed his tricks. The tribal lords of the steppe, in addition to paying tribute to cattle, sheep and horses, have to give information on the population, livestock, pastures, money and grain under their rule every year, and this has been practiced for many years.

Xinnazhi County, due to the military disaster in the first two years, there was a blank period of abandonment and stagnation in the matter, and now the city is under the control of the Xia army, and Liu Yuan will also pick it up again.

Liu Yuan personally accepted the book, and assessed the "political performance" with Li Li and Wei Qi, and promoted and degraded them as appropriate, saying that it was an assessment, but it was only to understand the local situation. In fact, it was just a show, as long as the local officials did not do too much and could help him maintain basic rule, Liu Yuan was "satisfied".

At this time, the Xia Kingdom, the gap between the upper and lower officials, but a little big, many counties, are one person to divide several positions, before from Meiji, recruited a lot of Han people living in the state to merge the state, plus the talents cultivated over the years, and then appointed some Chengcheng families, as county officials.

There are not many talents with the ability in place, and the top and bottom are actually a little chaotic and the development is slow. Fortunately, with the Xia army strongly guaranteeing the operation of the rule, a few Taishou talents are okay, and they can coordinate one side. In this way, Fang maintained his rule of Liu Yuan.

Thinking about the shortage of talents in China, at the beginning of February, Liu Yuan issued a merit-seeking order, spreading the book to the world, emphasizing the meaning of meritocracy. And built a tall and spacious recruitment hall in Jinyang City, but unfortunately the response was dull, and there were few applicants.

Many mediocre people, intending to cheat and cheat, pretended to be in front of Liu Yuan, and there was a person who couldn't even read a word, which made Liu Yuan quite annoyed, and was directly ordered by Liu Yuan to be secretly buried alive.

After meeting several waves of people, Liu Yuan was not in a very good mood, and he also rested on taking advantage of this to recruit talents. Give it to Li Li to dispose of, and if you can, you can have it, and don't have much hope. If you want to employ people, you can also be lured by interests, such as those dedicated families in Taiyuan.

It was not for nothing, there were more than a dozen scholars from the poor family who came to try their luck, and were arranged by Liu Yuan to serve as county officials in Hedong. For the officials in Hedong, Liu Yuan has begun to clean up, and the previous abuse of officials is indeed a bit of a miasma now. Hedong is the base for the Xia army to enter Guanzhong in the west, and the people's livelihood and civil affairs cannot continue to be chaotic.

There was also an unexpected joy, a young man named Hao Zhao came to the door, Liu Yuan learned about it, met him, and arranged for him to be the head of the guard. There are also some strong men, all of whom are included in the Jinyang Xia Army camp.

In general, Liu Yuan's order to seek talents had little effect, and there was even a feeling of laughing at the world. When the princes heard this, they all laughed. Cao Cao did have some gains, and soon personally made a "Seeking Talent Order", which was brilliant, the same thirst for talent, the same meritocracy, the difference is that the response is very great, and the Central Plains scholars are competing to vote.

When Liu Yuan heard this, even with his city government, he felt extremely unbalanced in his heart. In the palace, Liu Yuan angrily threw a lot of decorative utensils, and the servants around him all bowed their heads in annoyance. After calming down for a long time, Fang let out a nervous laugh: "I expected, why should I care so much?" ”

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In the Han world, since Dong Zhuo entered Beijing in the sixth year of Zhongping, it has also been chaotic for several years. The heroes divided and conquered each other, and in the fourth year of this early peace, a new round of reshuffle began.

The first to start a war was not the two forces of Xia and Jizhou, which were sharpening their knives in the north, but in the land of Yanyu Jingyang, which was the first to set off a war.

Yuan Shu's gang, taking advantage of Yangzhou's assassination of Chen Wen's southward direction to resist the increasingly powerful Sun Jian, attacked and occupied all Jiujiang County and the northern part of Lujiang from behind, killing Chen Wen, and his power expanded more and more. The momentum is unmatched for a while, even Yuan Shao of Jizhou can't compare to him, he is really the first prince in the world. Sun Jian occupied several county towns in Lujiang on the north bank of the Yangtze River, but he only dared to shrink his forces and was in a defensive state against Yuan Shu.

With the expansion of power, Yuan Shu was unwilling to be lonely again, and then moved his troops north, leading an army of 70,000 from Chen State in Yuzhou, invading Chenliu County, intending to take Yanzhou. Chen Liutai guarded Zhang Miao and could not defend, so he decisively retreated to Cao Cao for help.

It is the spring ploughing season, and Cao Boss is working hard to recuperate, develop people's livelihood, and accumulate money and grain. Yuan Shu came here, and it was menacing, and Cao Cao naturally could not let Yuan's army wantonly plunder Yanzhou counties and counties, and personally led 30,000 troops south to resist the enemy.

Yuan Shu's army sealed the hill, sent Liu Xianqian to Kuangcheng, and Cao Cao decisively besieged the city. Where can Liu Shen block it, ask for help, Yuan Shu got the news, and personally led the army to support.

Cao Cao had a plan, besieging Kuangcheng, he had the meaning of besieging the city to help, and he had been paying attention to the movements of Yuan Shu's main force. When it went north, he ambushed him first, and then sent Xiahou Yuan to lead the army to intercept his back road. This ability to unify the army, Cao Cao really threw off Yuan Shu a few streets, although the Yuan army is numerous, but the soldiers are not as elite as the Cao army, and the generals are not as brave as the Cao army. After two days of fighting outside Kuangcheng, Yuan Shu's army was defeated by Cao Cao.

Yuan Shu was defeated and retreated to Fengqiu, where is Boss Cao's territory, he can come when he wants, leave when he wants, and chase south decisively. wanted to besiege the city, but before it was closed, Yuan Shu led the defeated army to flee to Yuzhou. Starting from Dunqiu, he fled all the way in embarrassment, passing through Xiangyi, Taishou, and Ningling, Yuan Shu was repeatedly defeated, and was driven back to Jiujiang Fangzhi.

This battle took several months, Yuan Shu had a good hand, but unfortunately he found the wrong opponent, and was educated by Cao Cao's good life, and the upward trend ended here. did not capture a city or a city in Yanzhou, but was counterattacked by Cao Cao.

Yuzhou lost more than half, and Cao Cao's power was able to expand several counties to the south, and Yingchuan, Chen, Liang, and Pei were all occupied by Cao Cao. Coupled with the more than 20,000 Yuan soldiers and soldiers who were captured, Yuan Shu's wave of warmth made Cao Cao take a big step towards the status of the overlord of the Central Plains.

It happened that Li Dao and Guo Yan of Chang'an sent troops, and Cao Cao, who was victorious with Duan Xuan, sent Cao Ren to lead a partial army to teach him how to behave while pursuing Yuan Shu. The Xiliang army sent a lot of horses to Cao Cao and fled back in embarrassment.

As for Yuan Shu, this defeat is a bit too much, the loss of troops, the loss of counties, for him, is not a trivial matter. Most importantly, Yuan Shu's prestige was dealt a heavy blow. He no longer has the momentum to subdue the surrounding forces, such as Sun Jian, who seems to see that Yuan Shu is a "paper tiger".

Previously, Sun Jian went all out to the Jiangdong Economic Strategy, defeated Yan Baihu and other forces, recruited talented soldiers, and subdued the domestic families, and went all out to seize Yuzhang to the west.

The previous Yuan Shu was not easy to provoke, Sun Jian raised troops to the west, to fight Liu Biao, who looked better and bullied, and the two sides fought fiercely on the front line of Jiangxia and Chaisang. Facts have proved that Liu Biao is not so easy to bully, the Jiangdong land and water army is swimming against the current, although Sun Jun has the upper hand in the big war and continues to win small victories, it is always difficult to make a big breakthrough.

The defeat of Yuan Shu immediately caused a chain reaction, Sun Jian and Liu Biao stopped fighting, led the army back to the east, and once again aimed at Yuan Shu's chassis. Cao Cao can defeat Yuan Shu, and he Sun Jian thinks that he will not be bad.

Liu Biao's side is the same, sending Cai Mao as a general, commanding an army of 20,000 to the north, with the intention of recapturing Nanyang. Even Tao Qian made small moves and added thousands of troops to Guangling. In the face of the actions of several forces, Yuan Shu scolded the rats at the same time, and hurriedly recruited troops in the sphere of influence, gathered 100,000 soldiers again, and defended the four directions, which stabilized.

However, after Yuan Shu's actions, he missed the time when he ruled the peasants, and the rich and prosperous Huai River area was made more and more depressed by it.

Yuan Shu's forces are completely downhill.