In fact, throughout the thick history of the Twenty-five Years, the endurance and resilience of the people since ancient times can be said to be very high. There is an old proverb: It is better to be a peaceful dog than a troubled world. In this thick history, the common people in the Chengping era, whenever they had something to eat, they all begged for a stolen peace. Therefore, as long as the government does not toss and gives the land to the people to cultivate, they know how to earn food for themselves and their families.

Li Yanzhi repeatedly went to the countryside to investigate and investigate, and he didn't know whether to make him happy or sad about the facts he found. At present, the arable land area of Lingju County is insufficient, and with the influx of a large number of displaced people, there is a large-scale surplus of labor. Originally, Li Yanzhi wanted to let the young and strong of these displaced people build a road to the county government through the method of cash-for-work, but he remembered that the construction of the road consumed a huge amount of man-time and material resources, and in the coming year, these homeless people who did not cultivate still faced the dilemma of having no food to eat. After weighing the two phases, Li Yanzhi still gave up his unrealistic assumptions.

There is less arable land and more labor. That being the case, it is better to reclaim the wasteland. No matter what they do, food is the most basic guarantee. And if you want to have a strong army, expand the area of arable land, and accumulate more food, it is also the foundation of everything. On this basis, the next things can be carried out. Nothing can be done overnight. Moreover, in order to train a county soldier with strong combat effectiveness, it is not only necessary to educate officers and men to defend their territory against the enemy, to defend their homeland, and to train hard to develop strong combat skills. A strong army must also have strong material support. The swords, guns, swords, halberds, bows, crossbows and arrows used on the battlefield are all money!

When the head of the bald department said goodbye to Li Yanzhi, he also sent a sign of the sincerity of the bald department: they selected five strong cattle and five good horses as the first batch of livestock to be traded for Li Yanzhi to bring back to the county. Although the old man did not ask Li Yanzhi to immediately exchange goods or food for these five cattle and five horses. However, Li Yanzhi still insisted on paying the copper coins equal to five oxen and five horses at the market price. He also made it clear that he would send someone to contact him as soon as possible, and pay the grain that the man had asked for in exchange for the rest of the cattle and horses.

As soon as he returned to the county government, Li Yanzhi immediately summoned Wei Xu from the camp by name. He also asked him to take his subordinates and go to the granary of Fan Ji Grain Store to order 2,000 stone of grain, and then load it into a truck and prepare for transportation. Wei Xu was unequivocal, and immediately ordered all the people and went to the granary to inspect the grain. Now this granary has long been taken over by the county government, and the county lieutenant Chu has taken several clerks in the county to count the grain stored in the granary and record new account books. Now in the granary, there are also several county government officials guarding it.

The only thing that bothered Li Yanzhi was that the rough men under him were all illiterate. Therefore, every time the procedures such as leaving the warehouse and entering the warehouse, the county government clerk must be dispatched to assist. Now that the new county magistrate has taken office, all kinds of affairs are complicated, how can we always spare manpower to assist in these simple tasks? Even the original subordinates brought over by Li Yanzhi now have their own responsibilities. Xin Yan had no experience in politics before, and now he is governing a county for the first time, and he is also very busy. With Li Yanzhi's acquiescence, even those military men who were coarse in writing and ink were treated as treasures by Xin Yan, and they each handled a lot of work as a clerk.

So in this case, only Li Yanzhi personally assisted in the storage and storage of this granary. When Wei Xu was ordered to bring someone to check the grain, he also came with him. And personally weighed and recorded the grain out of the warehouse. Almost all the simple vehicles such as the board cart that the county government could mobilize were mobilized, and the craftsmen in the workshop hurriedly processed them, nailed partitions to the carts on all sides, and then added cage covers, etc., and then directly tied them to the horses and used them as vehicles for transporting grain. Two thousand stone of grain weighs more than 50 tons in later generations. It took Li Yanzhi a lot of effort to balance it as much as possible, so that the grain carried in each car was not stacked very high, and so that these limited vehicles could hold such a large amount of food.

In the end, more than 130 grain trucks loaded with more than 2,000 stone of grain, escorted by two hundred-man teams, left the county seat, and under the command of Li Yanzhi, set off towards the boundary of Xiping County.

The simple grain cart full of grain, pulled by mules, is naturally not fast to walk. Li Yanzhi has been thinking about the feasibility of achieving certain things during this particularly long journey. For example, at present, the grain is bartered with the Xianbei, Di, Qiang and other ethnic minorities in the Zhou territory, anyway, the county soldiers of Liangzhou County are now, especially the Xiping and Jinxing counties in the Huangshui Basin. Those ethnic minorities are also scattered, the surrounding environment is stable, there is no danger of survival for the time being, and there is a strong military force on the side, and the situation does not make them have any thoughts and ideas to make trouble. Moreover, the strong county soldiers in Xiping can also provide a strong guarantee for the fairness of the horse market.

Grain was exchanged for cattle, horses, sheep and other livestock of the nomads, and then the cattle could be used as labor to cultivate the land, and horses were added to the army. Sheep can be raised by displaced people who do not have land to cultivate. The goat's milk, meat, skin, and wool produced also have high economic value.

As for the timing of the establishment of this horse market, Li Yanzhi also made some careful consideration. It was decided that he would first operate a one-line trade with the Bald Hair Department and various Qiang tribes. These livestock, which were exchanged for grain, were used as labor on the one hand, and on the other hand, they were engaged in breeding. You can even transfer it to Guangwu or Guzang, or even Wuxing and Xihai counties, and sell it again, and you can get a lot of profits.

At the same time, it can also be imperceptibly suggested that Xin Yan bring in Xin Fei and even many foreign officials of the Xin clan one by one to carry out trade in various counties. Form a large and solid interest group.

Of course, Li Yanzhi is also very aware of the role he should play in this interest group. At the moment, he can only act as a behind-the-scenes operator, a suggestor. Those things on the table still need to be handed over to Xin Fei and Xin Yan to do. After all, as the wife of the first Liangzhou Zhang clan, although the Xin family does not have a powerful family in the center of state governance, they have been operating in various places for a long time, and their popularity is not comparable to themselves at all.

In an era when the Shi clan is highly respected and valued, these people are just as valuable and irreplaceable as they are. With the Xin family's people coming forward, Li Yanzhi himself was able to save a lot of things. The truth of making a fortune in silence has long been deeply rooted in his heart. He is not stupid enough to fight for these temporary fame, with huge financial resources, building a strong army is his ultimate goal.

For this purpose, no matter what price he has to pay at the moment, he is willing to try. What's more, his own ideas and changes, at the moment, have not caused a backlash to himself. The Yin clan, who had previously tried to annex the land in the township, did not take any action against him for the time being. Li Yanzhi also inquired from Xin Yan one after another, and the Yin clan in Lingju County, and Yin Ping, Yin Jian, Yin Yuan and others who are currently holding important positions in the state governance, can only be called distant cousins.

Li Yanzhi was almost alive in Jincheng before, and then Zhang Yuanjun personally gave him the words, and he thought that he was also a person valued by the envoy, and those high-ranking officials of the Yin clan in the state governance could not be guilty of arresting Li Yanzhi to death for a group of distant cousins who rarely interacted with him. What's more, Li Yanzhi can also be called clean and self-righteous on weekdays, and his ministry is not high. Even with the Yin clan people in Lingju County, there is no big enmity.

In any case, the things he is doing in Lingju County at the moment are far from reaching the level of attention from all parties. And this is exactly the result he wants.