The dispatch of the ten permanent servants really worked, first Dong Zhuo made repeated military exploits in Xiliang, pacified the rebellion of Bian Zhang and Han Sui, and then Sun Jian killed Ou Xing and recovered Lujiang. Zhang Rang and others were overjoyed when they heard the news, and hurriedly reported the good news to Liu Hong. Liu Hong officially issued an edict, appointing Dong Zhuo as the pastor of Liangzhou and the marquis of the township, and Sun Jian as the Taishou of Lujiang and the marquis of Wucheng.

When the news reached Xiangyang, Liu Xin looked up to the sky and sighed. Although he didn't think about stopping Dong Zhuo from occupying Xiliang, he had an instinctive resistance to Sun Jian's coming to Jiangdong, so as soon as he heard that Ou Xing had fled to Lujiang, Liu Xin couldn't wait to cross the border and use troops. It's a pity that Liu Xin tried his best and was not able to completely exterminate Ou Xing, but still gave Sun Jian a chance.

Back in the backyard, Liu Xin was still sullen, but when she looked up, she saw Ma Yun happily walking out of the room and said, "Husband, I have done a big thing today." ”

Liu Xin said strangely: "It's a big deal? What's up? ”

Ma Yun mysteriously took out a piece of white silk, handed it to him, and said: "Today, Ah Chou came to see her aunt again, I quietly dipped the white silk in water and wiped it on her arm, you see, this piece has turned gray." ”

Liu Xin didn't expect that Ma Yun had been entangled in whether the ugly had changed her appearance until now, and couldn't help laughing, and said, "Maybe the little girl hasn't taken a bath for many days and stained your handkerchief." ”

Ma Yun said unconvinced: "Who said it, I see that her arms are really much whiter, and one day I must find an opportunity to remove the birthmark on her face and take a look." ”

"Don't mess around, how do you make yourself like a child." Liu Xin knew that Ma Yun could do what he said, since Huang Chengyan made his daughter so ugly, he must have his purpose, why bother to expose others.

Thinking of Huang Chengyan, Liu Xin suddenly had a flash of inspiration in his mind and asked, "Does Ugly come often?" It's about to be the New Year, so if she comes back, remember to prepare some gifts for her. ”

"yes, almost once a month." Ma Yun suddenly smiled evilly, "Why did you think of asking Ah Chou today, did you figure it out and want her to be your daughter-in-law?" If you figure it out, you can ask Cai Mao to come out and talk about it. ”

Liu Xin said angrily: "Am I as boring as you?" I'm thinking that her father Huang Chengyan should also be a talented person, and this kind of person still has to be wooed. ”

Speaking of business, Ma Yun also put away her smile and asked, "Do you want to recruit Huang Chengyan?" ”

Liu Xin shook his head and said, "People like Huang Chengyan are keen on mountains and rivers, and they will not be willing to come out to be an official. However, according to legend, he was good friends with Sima Hui and others, and he should be familiar with Pang Tong, Xu Shu, and Zhuge Liang, and my idea was to recruit those people through him. ”

Ma Yun said: "Husband, your idea is good, but it is not realistic at present, who knows how old these people are now." ”

The two walked as they talked, and came to the room. Ma Yun waved her hand and asked the maids to retreat, she had already seen that Liu Xin's mood just now didn't seem to be very good, and when she saw that there was no one around, she asked with concern: "Husband, what troubles have you encountered?" ”

Liu Xin sighed and said, "I just got the news that Sun Jian captured Lujiang, and now he has been appointed as the Taishou of Lujiang. Sun Jian is a fierce tiger, and now that he is in Jingzhou, how can I rest assured. If it weren't for their dissuasion, maybe Lujiang would be in my hands by now, alas, if I am not careful, I will lose everything. ”

Ma Yun thought for a while and said, "Husband, you men are this bad problem, always eating from the bowl and looking at the pot." It's okay to treat women like this, and you have to keep a clear head when it comes to expanding your territory, and it's not yet time to conquer the world. Nowadays, all parts of the world are gradually in chaos, and it is not easy for Jingzhou to have such a peaceful situation. ”

Liu Xin was suddenly awakened by Ma Yun's words, and nodded again and again: "Wife, you have a point, I am indeed a little anxious for quick success." ”

Under Ma Yun's persuasion, Liu Xin's mood gradually calmed down, no one can become a fat man in one bite, everything must be done slowly.

In the entire four years of Zhongping, the Han Dynasty was turbulent, and rebellions broke out one after another, but Jingzhou was calm.

Jingzhou is no longer what it used to be, and the ditches all over the state ensure that agricultural production is no longer completely dependent on God's gifts. Although the whole of Jingzhou suffered a major drought this year, the harvest in summer and autumn was not greatly affected, and the newly built water conservancy facilities can be said to have contributed a lot. The roads extending in all directions, the stable social environment, to the development of commerce has brought great convenience, Jingzhou's tax revenue, commercial tax has accounted for 30% of the proportion, which was unimaginable in the past.

As a result of the introduction of lower land rents, peasants' incomes have also increased year by year, and the contradictions between peasants and powerful landlords have been eased to a great extent. The noble families also invested a large amount of money in handicrafts and commerce, and the huge profits they obtained could fully compensate for the losses caused by the reduction of the rent rate, and they also turned from resistance to support for Liu Xin's new tax policy.

Liu Xin has more time to spend with his family, and Liu Xin and Ma Yun can often be seen in and out of the east of the city, and the two of them always go in and out of the academy and research institute. While outsiders envy the love of their husband and wife, they also feel that Jingzhou is now prosperous, the society is stable, and Liu Xin, the state pastor, is really relaxed.

In fact, all this is just the appearance, Liu Xin has not relaxed for a moment, and the entire Jingzhou is loose on the outside and tight on the inside.

Liu Xin attaches the most importance to army building, and he always keeps in mind the phrase "power comes out of the barrel of a gun". In the past two years, the five major armies in Jingzhou have each expanded to 20,000 people, and the training has not been relaxed for a moment.

With Su Shuang and Zhang Shiping's horse shop, there were already 10,000 cavalry in the Jingzhou army. Not only that, Liu Xin also circled a large piece of land in Yunmengze in the Changsha area, established his own horse farm, and began to breed war horses by himself. The stirrups that Liu Xin had high hopes for had been mass-produced, but they were not equipped with troops, this was a secret weapon, and Liu Xin would not use it until the last resort. Although the research and development of stirrups, the research institute spent a lot of time and energy, but to put it bluntly, there is not much technical content, once it is made public, it will soon be imitated, so the stirrup is still in the stage of strict secrecy.

Another important achievement of the research institute in terms of weapons was the successful development of trebuchets, and after two years of research, the first trebuchet was finally produced. This trebuchet is very different from the first trebuchet in history, although it also uses the principle of leverage, but the trebuchet developed by Liu Xin has added something similar to the trigger and insurance in modern firearms, which can save manpower, make it easier to calibrate the direction of attack, and have a longer range.

The research institute is the place where Liu Xin and Ma Yun have devoted the most efforts. This is not only a place for the development of weapons, but also a lot of civilian tools and production technologies, which are more reflected in agriculture.

The Seed Farm is the outstanding work of the Institute. Through investigation, Liu Xin found a large area of wild rice in the Yunmengze area. Liu Xin knew that Yuan Longping's hybrid rice fed a billion people, and so many dynastic changes in Chinese history were related to peasant uprisings, and the main reason why farmers could not eat enough and could not survive was the main reason. The total amount of land is constant, and if over-reclamation will bring ecological disaster, then the best way is to increase production. At present, the grain used by the people of Jingzhou for farming is provided free of charge by the government, and this year, under the drought situation, the harvest is still nearly 20 percent higher than that of other places, and in addition to water conservancy facilities, grain seeds have also played a great role.

One of the things that Liu Xin is most proud of is that he introduced the concept of standardization into the institute. Whether it is a stirrup, trebuchet or a variety of civilian utensils produced, all the accessories are uniformly dimensioned, and their errors are strictly regulated. In this way, in the process of use, no matter which part is damaged, it can be replaced in time, especially for some weapons that are easy to be damaged in the war, which is very important, on the battlefield, two or several damaged weapons are disassembled and reassembled, it is a good weapon.

And Ma Yun is obviously more interested in the four great inventions of ancient China. Now, Xiangyang's papermaking technology has been very developed, and there is no difficulty in developing printing technology on this basis. Although she knew a lot about movable type printing, Ma Yun started with block printing, and the first thing she printed was the household register.

Household registration management is her old job, and Ma Yun can be said to be familiar with this. At present, Jingzhou's population is growing rapidly, and the stable environment, affluent life, and medical progress have brought about an increase in the birth rate and a decrease in the death rate, and at the same time, the development of Jingzhou has attracted a large number of foreign population. Today, Jingzhou's population lost due to the war has not only been replenished, but also increased to nearly 7 million people, and it is urgent to strengthen household registration management.

The compass was not only very important for navigation, but also played a great role in marching and fighting. Liu Xin struggled to find a few natural magnets. According to Ma Yun's impression, the oldest compass in China seems to be a spoon-like thing, but no matter how hard they try, they can't process the natural magnet into that shape, but they break several magnets one after another. In the end, there was no way, or honestly spent a lot of labor, and finally grinded the magnet into a needle shape, which was barely usable, but the effect was not ideal.

As for the invention of gunpowder, it is much simpler, the formula ratio of "one sulfur, two nitrate and three charcoal" was often mentioned by the chemistry teacher when Ma Yun was in middle school, and these things together became black gunpowder. However, there is still a long way to go in how to put this gunpowder to good use. Liu Xin does not want to see that the Chinese invented gunpowder that would only be used to make firecrackers, while the Westerners introduced gunpowder and produced guns to fight the Chinese.

Liu Hong simply turned a blind eye to the chaos in the land of Shenzhou, and continued to live his life of spending all day and drinking. Liu Hong summoned dozens of palace maids to bathe in front of him almost every day, and Liu Xin sent only a little bit of flying incense, how could he support him to squander it so much, and at the end of the year, this flying incense was finally exhausted.

Liu Hong, who finally felt a little "surname Fu", suddenly scratched his ears and cheeks, and there was nothing he could do. However, Zhang Rang came up with a good idea, he proposed to build a naked amusement hall in the West Garden, and let people collect green moss to cover it on the top of the steps, and attract canal water around the thresholds and circulate through the entire naked amusement hall. Liu Hong also chose a singer with jade skin and a light body to row a boat, swaying in the canal water. In the scorching heat of midsummer, he ordered the boat to sink in the water, and watched the jade-like skin of the [***] palace ladies who fell in the water, and finally aroused his interest a little.

Liu Hong and the palace maids drank in the cool hall of the naked tour hall [***], seeking pleasure, and often drank all night. He even sighed: "If this is the case for 10,000 years, it will be a god in the sky." Liu Hong often drank all night until he was so drunk that he was unconscious, and sometimes he didn't even know it was dawn. The chamberlains of the court had to throw a large candle at His Highness in order to wake him up from his dream, and even the chamberlains had to compete to learn how to crow to wake him up.

As the world became more and more chaotic, the heroes gradually surfaced, like Gongsun Zhan, he was originally just a small colonel in Youzhou, and he made several military exploits, and actually sat in the position of the Taishou of Beiping, Liu Bei After several twists and turns, he also became the county commander of the plain by the county lieutenant of Anxi, and Sun Jian took advantage of the local rebellion to further occupy Yuzhang County. Yuan Shao, Yuan Shu and others were also ready to move, and they each raised private soldiers.

After receiving these news from the phantom from many sources, Liu Xin suddenly had a feeling that the curtain was about to be opened. Liu Xin didn't think about assisting Liu Hong, but, not to mention "accompanying the king is like accompanying the tiger", the emperor's power is too great, and one sentence can kill you, just looking at Liu Hong himself, it will definitely not be able to help him. Rather than dragging down the whole country and even the whole nation by Liu Hong, it is better to let yourself replace him.

In February of the sixth year of Zhongping, the officials of Jingzhou, who had taken a month's vacation, returned to their yamen one after another. Liu Xin also sat in the hall, looking through various reports, he understood that it was getting closer and closer to Liu Hong's return to heaven, and it was time for this leisurely day to end.