Lingju County East Wuli, at the foot of the mountain. Originally, it was just a rocky beach along the backwater river. Now it has been leveled out by the soldiers of Lingju County. The piles of rocks that were scattered here have long since been removed. Those stones were smashed into gravel, and then in the winter of last year, the county commanders Xin Yan and Sima Li Yanzhi launched an action to increase the construction of the Lingju city wall, and they were built into the city wall of the heightened Lingju county.

And this vast river beach was repaired by the county soldiers into a new school field. The horsemen galloped back and forth in the mountainous area. At the foot of the hill are twenty or thirty wooden dummies. The foot soldiers, dressed in heavy armor, ran against the water. Now Li Yanzhi's tasks for these foot soldiers have already increased to a round trip between Lingju and the county government every day. In addition to the armor, two cast-iron discs of one foot square were tied to the front chest and back of the soldiers from time to time to exercise their endurance.

From the beginning of the bitterness, to the later habitual, these steps took a full year. Fortunately, their treatment is the most generous in the army, even if a family of ten can live without food and clothing by relying on the income of this infantry soldier in the army. Therefore, whenever they are tired from training, these soldiers can always grit their teeth and survive when they think about their relatives at home.

Cao Jian was in full swing on the school field, and he appeared on the edge of the school field a little inappropriately. Looking at the horsemen on the side of the mountain who were galloping back and forth, wantonly shooting the wooden dummy with the bow and arrow in their hands, his thoughts involuntarily drifted back to when he was in the Guangwu Army, and he himself was a pawn feeding horses. Now, a few years have passed. Although his position and achievements have advanced by leaps and bounds, Cao Jian misses those days even more.

Previously, Li Yanzhi was transferred to Lingju, but Cao Jian did not apply to accompany him. Although Li Yanzhi made it clear that he supported him to stay in Guangwu. But a series of events that happened later did not surprise him. originally thought that staying in the Guangwu Army would have a better development, but who knew that he ended up like this, which also made Cao Jian feel shameless to see Li Yanzhi again.

Xu knew Cao Jian's thoughts, so Li Yanzhi stopped Liu Jiwu and the others who wanted to go to greet him. Tell him to lead the team to practice as usual. And Li Yanzhi set up a table of wine banquet in his own room in the camp. After all, they have had such a long-term friendship with Cao Jian, and they don't say anything, and it's too unreasonable. It will also make Cao Jian think that he is still haunted by what happened at the beginning.

Cao Jianjian was alone outside the school field, which seemed a little out of place with the lively scene of the soldiers and generals on the school field. This strange scene was soon seen by Liu Jiwu, who was standing on the point general platform to supervise the drills of various armies. Liu Jiwu handed the order flag in his hand to Tao Heng, the deputy general on the side, and then strode off the platform and walked straight to the lonely figure on the edge of the school field.

Cao Jian, who was on the edge of the school field, saw a general Zuo coming down from the stage to him, and after a closer look, he realized that it was his old partner Liu Jiwu. Seeing Liu Jiwu's high-spirited appearance now, he suddenly felt that he was like a cloud of mud, but he felt a little more embarrassed and lost in his heart.

Liu Jiwu seemed to be unaware of Cao Jian's embarrassing loss. He stepped forward and took the burden Cao Jian was carrying, and then stretched out his right hand and was already carrying Cao Jian in the direction of the county seat. Now the most elite cavalry battalion and battle battalion in Lingju County have been managed by Liu Jiwu. Li Yanzhi also asked him to be able to do everything himself, so that these newly selected county soldiers could have a new atmosphere. Therefore, Liu Jiwu was in the camp, and he ate and lived with the soldiers. Every time it is time to practice, I will also visit the school in person. There is a sense of sharing weal and woe with the soldiers.

In addition, in the past year, there have been displaced people in Longxi who have fled to Lingju. Li Yanzhi selected some households with many families and settled in Lingju County. For the rest, an official letter was sent to the county government, asking the county government to accept some of them. And Guangwu County, which robbed Liu Zhao of several county taxes through Su Fu last year, was rich at this time. In addition, the expansion of the county town was not completed until this year, and it was also a time when there was a shortage of manpower. Xin Taishou accepted these homeless people as treasures and left.

There are nearly 1,000 households in Dingkou. Even if the fields continue to be cultivated, it will be difficult for the county to fully meet their needs for cultivation and food. Some of the households who could not get the land accepted the proposal of Li Yanzhi and Xin Yan and began to raise cattle, sheep, horses and other livestock provided by the county government. On weekdays, the county government provides food and clothing according to the amount. At harvest time, livestock products are exchanged for food.

These displaced people have long been accustomed to the exploitation of the wealthy clans and Liu Zhao in the Longxi region. They don't care about the lives of the people. Not to mention giving them food and clothing. Wandering so far, I have already seen through all the hardships of life. It's not easy to live, but where can we be perfect in everything?

Thus, within a mutually acceptable range, the resettlement of these displaced people can be regarded as a relatively successful end. Among these large number of households, each family sent a Dingkou to the county to serve as an auxiliary soldier in accordance with Li Yanzhi's request. The auxiliary soldiers themselves are provided with food and clothing by the county, and they mainly participate in various miscellaneous affairs in the army and the construction of various projects in the county. And for these auxiliary soldiers, the county government also has a certain relaxed policy, such as the regulations proposed by Xin Yan: the auxiliary soldiers' homes only pay half of the tax. That is to say, if there is a Ding Kou in the family who serves as an auxiliary soldier in the county, the family can be exempted from half of the tax.

As a result, the households, who were still worried about their men going to serve as soldiers, cheered and sent their men to the army. In this way, in addition to more than 1,000 regular soldiers, the auxiliary troops in the county also have a scale of about 1,000 people.

If it weren't for the fact that Lingju County was too small and didn't have so much land to accommodate reclamation, Li Yanzhi would have wanted to reclaim a large area of land and let these auxiliaries become military tuns. But the reality is brutal. If there is no land for them to cultivate, they can only develop a part of the side business. After thinking about it, Li Yanzhi stared at the dense woods in the mountains near the county seat.

Anyway, these forests are also naturally grown. Logging was inefficient in this era, and there were few concerns about over-consumption of natural resources. These more than 1,000 auxiliary soldiers were taken out by Li Yanzhi's appointed generals. These groves provide a steady supply of timber for the county. And high-quality timber can also become a commodity and an important strategic material reserve.

Today's Lingju County has already become a bit of a paradise. There are a variety of goods, and the grain and money have long been piled up in the county government treasury. In the county, a commercial street running through the east and west has also been opened. It was built at the expense of the prefectural government. Each shop only needs to pay a tax of ten cents to the county government every day, and you can buy and sell on this street for a day.

Although he has long since lost the desolate appearance he had when he arrived, Li Yanzhi still can't say that he is completely satisfied with these. It's just that the county soldiers that he has mastered that are gradually becoming stronger are the source of his infinite motivation.

Today's county soldiers, with the support of the iron produced by the iron ore in Wuxing County, are no longer the same as they were at the beginning. More than 200 horsemen have already reached the standard of one person and two horses. The selected more than 100 foot soldiers can now wear more than 130 catties of iron armor and march for dozens of miles with more than 10 catties of bladed long knives.

Another 200 soldiers with excellent arm strength were selected, and they took the strong bows and crossbows produced in the workshop and became crossbowmen. And the remaining 500 or so people have already changed their armaments. Nowadays, everyone has at least one piece of leather armor to cover their bodies, and the swords, guns and halberds in their hands are all sophisticated weapons produced in large quantities under the steel-filled method.

Cao Jian traveled all the way from the school, and what he saw and heard surprised him. In the conversation with Liu Jiwu, he learned about the real style of Lingju County today. can't help but secretly regret that he didn't follow Li Yanzhi to Lingju with him, which also cast a shadow on the originally good relationship between the two. It's a pity that it's too late to regret it.

The two walked and chatted all the way, and it took half an hour before they entered the county. Today's Lingju County, with the influx of a large number of displaced people between last year, has become lively. Cao Jian listened to the shouts of the peddlers and pawns in the streets and alleys of the city, looked at the sea of people on the streets in front of him, and couldn't help but admire: "Li Sima, it's very human!" ”

When Liu Jiwu heard this, he smiled, but said to Cao Jian: "Sima will prepare a banquet for you in the camp and wash the dust for you." I think that when I came here from Guanzhong, the friendship should be the deepest. Don't let down Sima's kindness and hard work......"

Cao Jian listened to Liu Jiwu's words, and his expression was also a little annoyed. However, he could only be silent, and followed Cao Jianyi into the camp. Liu Jiwu took Cao Jian all the way, and the guards he met saluted one after another. Liu Jiwu also nodded his head in response.

When he arrived at a room in the camp, Liu Jiwu stretched out his hand and knocked on the door, and Li Yanzhi's voice sounded inside: "Please come in!" ”

Liu Jiwu pushed open the door, pulled Cao Jian's sleeve, and led him into the house. In the house, Li Yanzhi was sitting on the top. In the middle of the room are several long tables that are spliced together. The rice wine, a variety of dishes on the Hu table, is extremely rich. And Cao Jian, who had just entered the house, looked at the delicious food on this table, but his face was gloomy.

Li Yanzhi saw that it was Liu Jiwu who led Cao Jian in, so he hurriedly stood up from the top, then bypassed the Hu table, walked forward quickly, grabbed Cao Jian's arm, and laughed: "Cao Jian! I've been here for more than a year, and I'm looking forward to you......"

Hearing Li Yanzhi's enthusiastic opening remarks, Cao Jian lowered his head, feeling ashamed, and said astringently: "Cao is unreasonable...... I was ashamed of Sima earlier, and I hope that Sima will ignore his previous suspicions......"

"What are you talking about?" Li Yanzhi pretended to be angry and said: "Earlier, when you stayed in the county, I was not unhappy in my heart. If you can make a difference in the county, I will be happy for you. We waited all the way from Guanzhong, and it is not easy to have today's situation, and we cherish it. ”

Although Cao Jian knew that Li Yanzhi probably didn't particularly care about this matter, hearing this passage from Li Yanjiong's mouth still touched a nerve called guilt in his heart.

"Let's go, I'll take you to see the appearance of the strong soldiers now!" Li Yanzhi saw Cao Jian's look of shame, so he quietly diverted the topic. Without saying anything, he pulled Cao Jian and walked out. As soon as the two went out, Liu Jiwu followed behind them. When he went out, he also closed the door of Li Yanzhi's house tightly.

Li Yanzhi pulled Cao Jianxing to the camp point of the general platform, Cao Jian followed Li Yanzhi's line of sight and looked at every place in the camp, although the barracks were made of clay, but they were arranged and distributed in a staggered manner. The soldiers patrolling the camp were brightly dressed and armoured, each holding swords, guns, swords, halberds, and marched through the barracks in an orderly manner. On the watchtowers at the four corners of the camp wall, there were also two soldiers on duty. The garrison of this county, after more than a year of training, has been able to be so orderly that it is not even inferior to the county soldiers. It also made Cao Jian secretly admire.

The two were on the podium, each looking in all directions. But they all remained silent tacitly. However, it didn't take long for a loud trumpet to sound outside the camp. Li Yanzhi knew that the soldiers who were training outside had returned to the camp, so he hurriedly turned his eyes to the gate of the camp. The first to come were the two hundred or so horsemen. While practicing on the school field, they were scattered in formation, running back and forth. At this time, however, they were in a neat formation, and they entered the camp one after another, and then kept a steady pace and marched slowly to the front of the point general's platform, where the generals reined in their horses, and then rolled their saddles and dismounted, waiting for the orders of the respective generals.

After the horsemen dismounted and lined up, they marched into the camp with neat steps from the gate to the foot soldier wearing iron armor and holding a long sword. Cao Jian was on the school field, and he had seen them panting and running against the water. I didn't think there was anything special about it. However, when the more than 100 ironclad foot soldiers marched into the camp in a neat formation, the kind of ironclad and unparalleled momentum was what surprised Cao Jian the most.

When Li Yanzhi saw Cao Jian's look of surprise when he faced this iron-armored foot soldier, he said to Cao Jian calmly: "This battle front battalion is formed by selecting tall and powerful men from the foot soldiers. Although the momentum is overwhelming now, after all, it has not been in battle, so it may not be of great use......"

Cao Jian looked at those soldiers with blazing eyes, and then turned his head to look at Li Yanzhi, and inquired about the general words: "But what Li Sima cares about the most is precisely this foot soldier, right?" ”

Li Yanzhi nodded: "I do have high hopes for them. But no one had ever made up such a pawn. One day when I go to the battlefield, I am not sure how they will behave. I just hope that they can be worthy of the hard armor and blades that have been created for them at the cost of manpower and material resources. ”

The generals of the cavalry and foot soldiers gathered under the general stage all found that it was Li Sima and another general who had some faces. Only some people who had previously spent time in the Guangwu Army recognized that the general who stood with Li Yanzhi was Cao Jian, who had been absent for a long time.

Seeing that all the troops in the audience looked at themselves. Li Yanzhi also knew that they were waiting for his orders, so he took a few steps forward, and then said loudly: "Disband!" When the drum sounds, they will each take it to the room to eat! ”

Under the disbandment order, those soldiers did not disperse in a hurry, but brought back one after another under their own orders. Then Li Yanzhi beckoned to Cao Jian and said with a smile: "How the soldiers of Lingju County, you have also seen it with your own eyes." This will go back with me, and when I meet you again today, I will replace wine with water and pour you into a round belly......"

Li Yanzhi took Cao Jian and walked towards the house where he lived in the barracks. Just as the two of them were about to push the door and step in, they heard a loud report behind them: "Report - Li Sima." Zhang Wancai, the leader of the second team of the cavalry battalion, presented a letter from Shangzhou for Sima! ”

Li Yanzhi turned around in surprise, picked up the letter in the hand of the commander, and saw that the envelope was sealed with fire paint. The seal is also faintly visible on it.

He held the letter in front of his eyes and carefully observed the fire paint until he saw that the seal was the two seal characters engraved by Yang: Zhang Mao.

Li Yanzhi's right hand drooped down, and his face was already full of color!