After hearing Tian Ying's words, King Qi said: "I already know the news you heard, is it the matter of the prince of the Song Kingdom who is now being praised by everyone?" ”

Tian Ying hurriedly replied, "Yes, father." www.biquge.info Now the state of Chu has blatantly betrayed its word in order to default on the debts of the Song state, and even the marriage between the state of Chu and the state of Song has been dissolved. The relationship between the two countries has deteriorated now, and now that Wei has been defeated by Qin, it is the time of decline, and this is the best time for us to attack Song. ”

King Qi replied: "Although the Song State is not in harmony with the Chu State, there are virtuous sons like Ziyan in the Song Kingdom, and this country cannot be taken lightly. Our country has just broken away from the war, how can it easily offend a strong country? ”

"Father, the position of the Song Kingdom is too important, and it is on the main road to the south of our country, and the opinions of the sons and daughters are not all taken from the Song Kingdom. The Taoqiu of the Song Kingdom, located at the intersection of water transportation, is a place where merchants from all over the world gather. In this war, it was the merchants of Taoqiu who supplied large quantities of grain and grass to the states of Chu and Zhao. In my opinion, we should take advantage of this time to seize the Taoqiu of the Song Kingdom in order to control the world. Tian Ying explained.

Capture the Taoqiu? Such a suggestion really hit King Qi's heart.

Since the Wei State opened a chasm, the Song State opened the Heshui, and Taoqiu rose to become the commercial center of the world, the King of Qi has heard of Taoqiu's wealth.

However, the location of Taoqiu is too sensitive, it is located in the center of the world's water transportation, and the king of Qi's unauthorized competition for Taoqiu is very likely to cause joint opposition from Chu and Wei, so he has always given up this goal. And only the Song state, where Taoqiu is located, is used as a buffer state between the Wei state and the Qi state.

However, during this war, the king of Qi also heard that all countries in the world bought grain from Taoqiu. The grain price of Taoqiu has even become the benchmark of the world's grain price!

Qi is a typical commercial power, and its entire country is heavily affected by commerce. Not to mention the benefits and wealth of Qi State, even the military system in this country is a mercenary-style mercenary system. In the eyes of the King of Qi, if he can capture Taoqiu, then he will be able to have more food when he launches a war in the future, which is invisibly equivalent to enhancing the war potential of the Qi country!

Taoqiu, Qi is bound to win!

Soon, the king of Qi summoned Xiangguo Zou Ji and began to discuss specific actions.

The military system of the Qi State was to recruit mercenaries to select skilled fighters, which made the frontal combat effectiveness of the Qi army weaker than that of Wei Wushu and Chu Wushu. However, this military system of Qi also has advantages that the military system does not have: as long as the state treasury still has money, new troops can be recruited at any time.

Just like this Great War of Nations, both Qi and Wei suffered serious defeats as the overlords of the world, but Qi hardly needed to recover to draw another army to participate in the war. And because a large number of soldiers trained by the state died on the battlefield with huge sums of money, Wei did not have more than ten years to recover its original strength at all. Obviously, the countries of the world will not give Wei ten years to restore its glory. Therefore, the decline of the Wei state is already a permanent decline, and the decline of the Qi state still has a chance to recover.

In July, the king of Qi recruited 50,000 skilled fighters from China, with Tian Pan as his general, and Chen soldiers in Pinglu, an important town in the south of Qi State, prepared to start attacking Taoqiu.

And such a large-scale action in Qi State could not hide the businessmen who did business in Qi State, and a Song State merchant named Cao Yi happened to be in Pinglu at this time. He used to be one of the many small businessmen in arrears in the Chu State, after learning that the people of the Chu State were in arrears, he originally thought that he would lose all his money, but he did not expect the young son of the Song State to come out and take responsibility and pay off the debts, which made Cao Yi always admire Dai Yan very much, and he always wanted to find an opportunity to repay Dai Yan and return to the Song State.

Therefore, after learning the news that Qi was about to attack Taoqiu, he immediately abandoned his business, hurried back to Song, and reported the news to Dai Yan.

The news that the Qi State was about to capture Taoqiu made the Song monarchs and ministers very uneasy. Today's world is the moment of complete decline of the Wei State, and the situation in the world is undergoing great changes. And the Song State had just made a bad deal with the Chu State, and in the face of the attack of Qiang Qi, the Song State itself would definitely be unable to defend against it.

If you want to deal with the Qi State, the Song State must find foreign aid! However, although the Song State is still in the Three Kingdoms, the balance between the three kingdoms of Wei, Chu, and Qi has been broken, who else can the Song Kingdom find?

Zixi sat on the main seat with a gloomy face, and asked the ministers of the Song State in the audience: "Now that the Qi State is attacking our country, do all Aiqing have a strategy to resist the enemy?" ”

He looked at Xiangguo Le Cheng, and Le Cheng had no choice but to say to the monarch: "Now that our country and the Chu State are at loggerheads, the Wei State has suffered a great defeat in Hexi, and it has declined, and my Song State itself cannot defeat the Qi State." The land of Taoqiu used to be the land of Cao State, and it was obtained by my Song State after destroying Cao. Since our Song Kingdom obtained this land, it has not been able to completely control this territory. And the merchants of Taoqiu are powerful, and some time ago they even dared to coerce my country and Ziyan to repay their debts. With such a troublesome place, I think it is better to hand it over to the Qi State, and my Song Kingdom will be able to avoid military disasters. ”

Le Cheng's description of Taoqiu is also basically in line with reality. In fact, the main reason why Le Cheng suggested giving up Taoqiu was that Le did not have any interests in Taoqiu, so the existence of Taoqiu had little impact on Le Clan.

Hearing Le Cheng's words, without waiting for others to react, Da Sima Xiangshe rose up first to object, "Qi State is only Chen Bing Pinglu now, and it has not yet entered Taoqiu, and Xiangguo is about to cede Taoqiu?" If the Chen soldiers of the Qi State are under the city of Suiyang in our country, will the Xiangguo ask the king to merge my Song State into the Qi State? The tone was extremely unkind.

Le Cheng immediately objected, and he said: "Qi is a big country in the world, is Sima Ke sure that he can defeat Qi State?" If the war is defeated, our country will not be as simple as losing a place like Taoqiu. ”

Xiang She was even more angry when he heard Le Cheng's words: "The war has not yet been fought, how can you judge whether my Song State can win the Qi State?" Every city in my Song Kingdom was snatched up by our ancestors with blood, where can we cede it at will? ”

Then the two began to fight fiercely.

Zixi was even more helpless about such a scene, and then he had to order to stop the quarrel between the two, and he asked the most critical question: "Qi is now outside the gate of our country, what should my country do?" ”

Dai Yan had to speak up at this time: "Your Majesty, the minister thinks that my Song State should first mobilize the domestic army to defend Taoqiu; Second, we should send envoys abroad to seek assistance. ”

Because the debt incident of Chu and the cancellation of the marriage between Chu and Song both happened during Dai Yan's mission to Chu, although the main cause of these two events was in Chu, but as a great pedestrian of Song, he was also responsible for this kind of thing, and both of these events greatly weakened his political prestige. Although Dai Yan personally repaid the debts of the merchants and became famous in the world, in Suiyang, Dai's husbands were less and less optimistic about this young son as a big banker.

Zixi's mastermind Hua Rong spoke: "Ziyan, what you said is of course right. Mobilize the army in the country, and we will be able to do this right away. However, if I go abroad and ask for assistance, which country can I ask for now? The State of Wei has fallen down, and the State of Chu has also been offended by Gongzi, which country can I ask for help from the Song State? There was a strong smacking flavor of sarcasm in his words.

When the old husbands of the Song State heard this, they also responded in groups: "If Ziyan does not offend the Chu State, my country may be able to keep Taoqiu now, and now the only Chu State that can help our country cannot help our country, where can Taoqiu still be kept?" I don't think I'd just send the Tao Qiu out. ”

Hearing such opinions, the small nobles who had obtained the Dongyi fiefdom were excited one by one, and they spoke out against each other's opinions: "Ziyan was in charge of the diplomacy of the Song State and took advantage of the war to earn a lot of wealth for our country; It also enabled my Song Kingdom to obtain the land of Jiuyi and control Hangou. This is a great achievement that I have not achieved in the Song Kingdom for hundreds of years, how can you slander Ziyan like this? ”

"The land of Jiuyi is a wilderness, can it be compared to the richness of Shangtaoqiu? Ziyan has put my Song Kingdom into the current crisis, and he is no longer worthy of being a great pedestrian of the Song Kingdom, and the ministers and others suggest that the king revoke the position of Ziyan Daxingren! "The old people are also excited.

Seeing that the two sides began to fall into mutual strife again, Zixi was a big head. He had to look at his brother, hoping that he would be able to clean up the mess himself.

In such a situation, Dai Yan had no choice, so he stood up and said to the monarchs and ministers of the Song State: "The soldiers of the Qi State are coming to the city, as long as there is a bloody person in our country, we will not let the Qi State take the territory of the Song State!" The minister asked the king to immediately mobilize the domestic army, Chen Bing Taoqiu, and not let the Qi soldiers enter my Song country! As a member of the Song Dynasty, I will personally go abroad to rescue the soldiers, and if you give me a month, I will definitely move the rescuers. If I can't do it, then a month later, I will personally return to Taoqiu and fight to the death against the Qi Kingdom! Taoqiu was captured, and that was when my son died and died for his country! ”