Although it is already early spring in the south of the Great Sui River, there is not much spring here. As Yang Guang went out of the Jiangdu to inspect the outside of the Saiwai, some forces in the south began to move, and the big families sent their cronies and children to ten miles and eight towns to buy grain, salt and iron tools.

The cool officials in the rampant townships are also like gophers after hibernation, emerging from all dark corners, and the counties in the south of the Yangtze River are suddenly in a miasma, and the people are full of complaints.

Fortunately, although Jiangnan has also experienced the great turmoil of the Northern and Southern Dynasties, its vitality has not been greatly damaged, and the reason for this is that most of the wars in these years have been carried out among the northern counties, even if they have sporadically affected Jiangnan, they have not formed any destructive force.

In addition, the southern capital of the Great Sui is located in Jiangnan, and Yang Guang deployed a large number of troops in the Jiangnan area in order to consolidate his political power, which also indirectly stabilized the situation in Jiangnan.

These are all things on the surface, and even the common people are generally very clear.

In fact, if you want to say that Jiangnan has not experienced a major war, there is another reason that the family in Jiangnan has played a great role.

Although the Jiangnan family and the five families with five surnames in the north are all top wealthy families of the Great Sui Dynasty, if you want to really compare, there are really many differences.

No matter how strong the five surnames and seven families are, they are all in the north, and each has its own sphere of influence, Boling Cui, Qinghe Cui, Fanyang Lu, Longxi Li, Zhaojun Li, Xingyang Zheng, Taiyuan Wang are all replaced by place names, to put it bluntly, it is the local Haoqiang.

But what makes them stronger than Hao is that these families have been inherited for hundreds of years, and the children in the clan are all focused on cultivating, and the big families have their own clan studies, and the children have all entered the court as officials when they become adults, intervening in politics, doing business in a small number, controlling the economic lifeline, and after hundreds of years of evolution and inheritance, they are already behemoths by the end of the Sui Dynasty.

Where there are interests, there will be fights, and these are indispensable between several major families. So the combination is vertical and horizontal, and strange schemes are frequent, of course, the most is the intermarriage between the big families. This not only solved some contradictions between them, but also greatly increased the power of these families, overriding the court and the law, and even Yang Guang had to try his best to restrain it, so there was the defeat of the Three Expeditions to Goguryeo.

Compared with the five surnames and seven families, the Jiangnan family in the south is a dominant family, headed by the Lanling Xiao family, which is the only one.

Lanling Xiao is the top gate valve, the rise was in the Western Han Dynasty Emperor Xuan Emperor period of the minister Han Prince Taifu Xiao Wangzhi began, and from the Eastern Han Dynasty to the end of the Western Jin Dynasty more than 200 years in the middle of the fall, to the end of the Western Jin Dynasty when the south moved, because of the size of the family and make the Sima family placed Xiao in Wujin, Jiangsu, known as "South Lanling", so it is still commensurate with the Lanling Xiao family, for the Southern Dynasty "four overseas Chinese hope", unspeakably expensive. The real rise of the Lanling Xiao family was already the world's gate valve as early as the end of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and since then, it was not until the end of the Tang Dynasty that the five dynasties and ten kingdoms were in decline with the world's family. The famous poet Yu of the Northern Zhou Dynasty is credited with "factions and heavens, and branches are like trees", and even the great writer Su Dongpo also praised "shaking the desire to be a well-dressed watch, and success should be followed by eight Xiao". The Xiao clan of Nanlanling founded the two dynasties of Qi and Liang, and produced twenty-one emperors, more than 30 prime ministers, and a large number of civil and military generals, literati and elegant guests.

Yang Guang's queen Empress Xiao is also Xiao Miao's uncle and aunt.

At the end of the Sui Dynasty, the patriarch of the Xiao clan in Jiangnan was born in the imperial family, and his ancestor was Xiao Yan, the founding emperor of the Southern Liang Dynasty, and his great-grandfather Xiao Jing was the founding emperor of the Western Liang of the Southern and Northern Dynasties. His grandfather, Xiao Yan, betrayed the Sui Dynasty and surrendered to the Chen Dynasty in the early years of the emperor's reign. In the ninth year of the emperor's reign, the Sui Dynasty destroyed the Chen Dynasty, and Xiao Yan was killed by Emperor Wen of Sui. Xiao Mian was lonely and poor when he was young, and he made a living by selling books, and he was very filial to his mother. When Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty, he was promoted to Luo County Order because of the kindness of his relatives.

Although the Lanling Xiao family has declined in Xiao Mill's generation, Xiao Mill, who has several generations of royal blood flowing in his veins, has never given up the dream in his heart. Moreover, although the Xiao clan is declining too quickly, disciples from the Xiao clan's family studies still abound in the imperial court, especially in the southern capital of Jiangdu.

What is even more commendable is that these people from the Xiao family have the same dream of recovering the country in their hearts, just like Xiao Miao. This is the most terrifying thing about the family, they can not only cultivate talents, but also completely brainwash these people.

Don't look at Xiao Milling is just a small Luo County Order now, it seems that the feathered phoenix is not as good as a chicken, in fact, in private, even those high-ranking officials in the court dare not underestimate Xiao Mill, a small person, because Xiao Milling not only represents himself, but represents the Lanling Xiao family, and also represents the orthodoxy of those ministers of the Liang Dynasty in their hearts.

In a word, as long as Xiao Mo lives, once he wants to raise the banner of anti-Sui, then he is the embodiment of orthodoxy, and there will be a reason for the rebellion, and the teacher will be famous. It can be said that as long as Xiao Mill raises his arms and shouts, overthrows the violent Sui and rebuilds the Liang Dynasty, there will be countless people who will wave their flags and shout for it, which is the confidence of the family.

Xiao Mo himself is extremely intelligent, and knows how to forbear, although he lives in a corner, but he privately recruits warriors, has enough food and grass, privately casts military armor, and secretly contacts the old Liang Xianbu in the Jiangdu Dynasty, befriending the old officials, and then opening the way with silver money, bribing the internal prison in the palace, just waiting for the time to mature.

It is simply impossible to say that a family can quietly complete these actions in front of everyone. Even if Yang Guang's eyeliner is no longer capable, it will not make him so rampant. The point is that he is in a convenient place.

It has been more than 100 years since Xiao Yan established the Liang Dynasty in the entire Jiangnan region, during which no matter how the dynasty changed, the Xiao family has never withdrawn from the political arena, so the Xiao family is all over the counties in the south of the Yangtze River. Without the constraints of other families, Xiao Mo is like a fish in water.

In addition, Luo County is located in Baling County, with accessible waterways but mountainous land routes, as long as the Xiao family controls the waterway, it controls the lifeline, and Xiao Mo is slowly accumulating his power in such an environment.

Baling County is bordered by Nanjun and Chuyang County in the north, Jiangxia County in the east, and Liyang County and Wuling County in the west. There are Dongting Lake and the Yangtze River in the county, which is the accessible place for the five counties. Therefore, although Baling is mountainous, it is still well-developed and densely populated.

The two cities of Luoxian and Baling are on the east two corners of Dongting Lake, facing the mountains and the lake, which is a place where soldiers must fight. Xiao Mo has been working hard since he took office, and now Luo County has become the second most prosperous place in Baling County after the seat of governance Baling.

It is precisely because of the prosperity of commerce and the vast fields that the grain harvest in Luo County is many times that of the surrounding areas. Coupled with the large amount of manpower and material resources provided by the Xiao clan, Xiao Mo revitalized the decaying Xiao family in just a few years.

Xiao Miao's ambition is to destroy the Sui Dynasty and restore the Liang, so these things are just the capital of Xiao Miao's growth, and his main energy is still on the monitoring of Yang Guang and the gains and losses of the government.

Xiao Miao's subordinates not only recruited dozens of literati staff and masters, but also many people from the rivers and lakes who were hired by him to teach private soldiers. There are many rivers in the south of the Yangtze River, and if Xiao Mo wants to unify in the north, he must have his own water division, so the large and small water bandits in Dongting Lake have become his target to win over him with heavy money, and privately teach soldiers armor, and gradually, these water bandits were armed by him.

After all, the water bandits are water bandits, and they don't have a serious leader, and they are given arrogant capital, so the boats passing in Dongting Lake have become their class lunch, and meat is on the board. Xiao Mo is very clear about the water bandits' every move, but he doesn't restrain these people too much, he knows very well that these people are just his cannon fodder, once the banner of righteousness is raised, they are at most in front of the façade, the real main force still depends on his private soldiers.

So the people around Dongting Lake and the past business travelers suffered, and with the acquiescence of Xiao Miao, there was a lot of rumors for a while, and the Dongting Lake where the people relied for their survival became a dead place for them to talk about the tiger's color.

The water bandits also want to eat, and seeing that there is no head in the Dongting Lake, so under the leadership of the two largest water bandits, the Dongting Lake water bandits are killing in groups towards the Yangtze River, where there are more sheep waiting for them to slaughter.

Xiao Mo knew that his first step had been successful, and he used these water bandits to open up the passage in and out of the Yangtze River.

Then Xiao Mo sent a personal guard under his command down the Yangtze River to the east, lurking in various important towns from Baling County to Jiangdu, sending him a steady stream of news. And relied on these people to secretly control the privacy of many court officials, thus controlling them.

It is said that it is a personal guard, in fact, it is not accurate, they have a resounding title "Dragon Guard", as soon as you hear the name, you know that Xiao Mo compares himself to a real dragon, what is a real dragon, it goes without saying, the Son of Heaven also!

These dragon guards are like eyes hiding in the dark, probing the news of various places in the Great Sui Dynasty at any time. Xiao Mo knows very well that if you want to succeed, you must know yourself and your opponent.

Everything was going according to Xiao Miao's plan, but just a few months ago, the news from the north still surprised Xiao Miao.

I don't know when there was an important figure in the Great Sui court and the northern people-Mingyue Gongzi.

At first, Xiao Mo didn't pay much attention to it, but he heard the literati sing the masterpieces of this Mingyue Gongzi, and later even those warblers and Yanyan on the banks of the Qinhuai River also fell in love with this Mingyue Gongzi, and actually wanted to form a team to go to the north to meet it with their own eyes.

It's a pity that it happened just in time for Yang Guang's northern tour, which made the northern counties jump and jump, so Xiao Mo didn't pay attention to it anymore. But it didn't take long for the reputation of this Mingyue Son to appear in Xiao Miao's ears again, and this time he was no longer calm, it turned out that Li Xiang's inventions had been sold to the south.

Everything else is okay, the key is that the pinyin and movable type printing technology really attracted Xiao Miao's attention.