The envoy sent by Cao Cao to Li Sheng's side to ask for negotiations was the Yangwu general of Yunwen Yunwu, Manzhong. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info he walked quickly, because he knew that the situation on his side was very dangerous. Although Cao Cao sent an expedited expedition of 800 miles to chase after him, wanting to grant him the latest policy and the corresponding permissions, it still took four days to catch up with the favored team on the banks of the Weishui River.

"Plenipotentia?" After receiving this order, Man Zhong looked at the latest requirements given to him by his own bus, and couldn't help but be surprised: "It seems that the king is sure of one thing and has made a very difficult decision." He muttered to himself.

The so-called certain point refers to Cao Cao's admission that Li Sheng's side is stronger than himself in all aspects, and he wants to reverse such backwardness, and wants to change the weakness of his side and make himself strong by learning from Li Sheng, which is a very difficult thing, because Li Sheng's success is based on greatly weakening the power of the family's gate valves: in Jingnan, in Jiaozhou, in Yizhou, and in Liangzhou as invaders; Li Sheng used violent means to accomplish this matter, and under such violence, the private soldiers of the gate valve were forcibly discharged, and the field property of the gate valve was greatly reduced. The gate valve can no longer become a powerful force to restrain Li Sheng's policy, which makes Li Sheng's interest binding move a great success. Under Li Sheng's encouragement of industry and commerce, a large number of families invested their money in Li Sheng's workshops, trade and other industries, so that these industries developed vigorously, which gave Li Sheng the strength he is now.

In Manzhong's view, although Li Sheng's method has merits, it is not suitable for his own side, because the foundation of his own side is not a glance on Li Sheng's side: the lord Cao Cao's attitude towards the gate valve is to suppress the gate valve that does not obey himself, and to win over the gate valve who obeys his own words. Under Cao Cao's rule, many of the gate valves were destroyed, but many new ones arose, and they took the place of the old ones as forces that obeyed Cao Cao. However, like the old gatekeepers, they used the possession of a large amount of land as the basis of their power - which was completely different from Li Sheng's side. If you have to follow Li Sheng's method, I am afraid that this foundation will have to be adjusted, and this adjustment will obviously be a disaster.

"Hey...... I don't know what the king himself thinks. Full of favor sighed, but others were outside, and he had no choice but to take orders for Cao Cao to make such a decision.

Of the two roads from Wei to Tang, Man Chong chose the route of Chang'an-Hanzhong-Yizhou. In Manzhong's opinion, although it is very tiring to walk from here, because it is all by land, the speed can be completely controlled by himself, and from Hanzhong, Li Shengjun has seen all the checkpoints all the way. At present, Wei and Tang are in a state of war, and Man Chong is very confident that after he goes to the checkpoint, he can see Li Shengjun's reality to some extent, which is different from when Cheng Yu came to the two sides were at peace, and Li Sheng hid everything extremely secretly. For this reason, Man Pet decided to hurry hard before arriving at Yangping Pass, and after arriving at Yangping Pass, he walked slowly and looked carefully.

This is obviously a good idea, but after the full pet arrived at Yangping Pass, he found that everything was very different from what he imagined, Li Sheng seemed to have known about his arrival, and he had already sent a group of people there to receive him, and accompanied him to CD where the reception was. It's just surveillance! Man Zhong muttered to himself in his heart, but his face was full of smiles and greetings with the envoy of the Tang King who came to receive him. The envoy sent by Li Sheng was Deng Zhi, and for this young envoy who had caused trouble in Xuchang a few years ago, he had to fight with his spirits to deal with it. He knew that in Li Sheng's territory, the right time, place and people were not on his side, so he didn't dare to have too many opinions, basically what Deng Ai said, he would do whatever he wanted. Originally, the observation plan agreed in his heart became a distant matter because of Deng Ai's appearance and supervision. He was extremely dissatisfied with this, but he didn't dare to show such dissatisfaction. Because he saw Deng Zhi's face. It was a cold look, as if someone owed him

Tens of thousands of dollars in general. Man Zhong knew that this Deng Ai was also dissatisfied, which made him a little curious: "Where does this Deng Zhi's dissatisfaction come from?" Manpet thought and fell into confusion.

No matter how witty Ren Manzhong was, he couldn't have imagined that Deng Zhi's anger was given to him by Li Sheng-because Cao Cao's side suddenly proposed negotiations, Li Sheng was extremely dissatisfied with Cao Cao.

"Damn, our plan probably won't come to fruition." After knowing Haoyue's report, Li Sheng's brows were tightly tangled. He was able to guess Cao Cao's thoughts, and he also admired Cao Cao's ability to make a strong man's decision to break his wrist so quickly under such an unfavorable situation, but Cao Cao's decision interrupted his advance plan, interrupted his own plan, weakened his expected benefits, and preserved the power of the enemy Cao Cao, which made Li Sheng unhappy no matter what. For a while, Li Sheng's face became a little more bitter than the bitter gourd.

"Is it bad for us that the plan doesn't come to fruition?" Seeing that Li Sheng was so distressed, the staff officer Ling Fazheng asked him with a smile.

"It doesn't hurt. It will cost more money and food. However, it is worth using this money and food to prove the combat effectiveness of our own newly reequipped troops, and the money, food, and population we have plundered from Xuzhou, Qingzhou, and Jizhou are enough to offset the consumption on our side, and there is still a surplus. We've earned it, but if it goes on like this, we're afraid we'll get more. For example, weakening the combat effectiveness of Cao Cao's side. Li Sheng looked at Fa Zheng and said leisurely.

"Well, since it's already earned. It's just a matter of earning less. What else is the king greedy for? Fa Zheng asked Li Sheng with a smile: "It's not impossible if you continue to fight." It's just that if you continue to fight like this, it is possible to achieve your goal, but it is also possible to jump over the wall and have a decisive battle with us. I am afraid that we cannot afford it. I don't think we're going to be able to start a final war with our current strength. ”

"Of course!" Li Sheng is still clear about his own strength, so he gave a positive answer to Fa Zheng's words: "With our current strength, our development speed, and the level of training of the army, if we want to send troops to dominate the world, it will take us at least ten years." Speaking of this, Li Sheng couldn't help but pause, and then continued: "It is precisely because we still need ten years to develop our strength that I want Cao Cao to suffer more losses. My hope is that our strength has developed, and Cao Cao's strength has stopped, and the gap between us and Cao Cao is getting wider and wider. This will be very helpful for us to finally unify the world. ”

"But how many things go well in the world? Cao Cao is not a fool, although your plan is good, Cao Cao would never have imagined that we would start with their economy, but with the wisdom of Cao Cao and his men, he can instinctively perceive the danger of the situation. Now that they have made a concession, we should naturally go with it. Cao Cao's strength has been lost, but his loss is not big, if we get too close, I am afraid that there may be a real situation of rebellion. Fa Zheng said with a smile, and at the same time persuaded Li Sheng: "The king has developed from a foundation that is much weaker than Cao Cao to the present, and our strength has faintly overwhelmed Cao Cao. In the past, when the king was weaker than Cao Cao, the king didn't have so many scruples, and now the king's strength is about the same as Cao Cao, what are you afraid of? ”

"Well...... this!" Li Sheng was slightly stunned by Fa Zheng's words, thought for a while, but laughed: "You are right." Then let's greet the arrival of Cao Cao's envoy with a smile. But we can't give Cao Cao's envoy a good face. ”

"Oh?" Fa Zheng was slightly surprised: "Why? He asked with a smile.

"Because we and Cao Cao are enemies, because we prepared a big meal for Cao Cao later. Generally speaking, the more depressed we appear on the surface, the stronger the worry in Cao Cao's envoy's heart will be. After that, we drag it out a little bit more while we are negotiating, and it will be easier for all of this to happen. Li Sheng said with a smile: "Since Cao Cao wants to talk, then everything must be discussed according to our requirements." Whatever we say, Cao Cao basically has to do. Maybe Cao Cao's side didn't want to do this, but we wanted to create such a situation to force him to do so.

"Persecution?" Fa Zheng was slightly stunned when he heard this, and he quickly changed from not understanding at the beginning to understanding. "Your Majesty, you are treacherous." Fa Zheng looked at Li Sheng with admiration, as if he couldn't figure it out, the king had a headache for Cao Cao's proposal for peace talks, why did he suddenly put his mind on how to use Cao Cao's negotiations to obtain the most benefits for himself? That's amazing.

Looking at Fa Zheng's gaze, Li Sheng was a little complacent. The vanity in his heart was satisfied, and a satisfied smile naturally filled his face. But he smiled and laughed, but his mouth was full of humility: "Where, where!" I just made the best choice for us. You know, people who do things like ours can't do without a little scheming anyway. Because then you will only helplessly send yourself into the abyss of destruction. ”

"I know that." Fa Zheng nodded understandingly, and then discussed specific matters with Li Sheng. It was during this discussion that Fa Zheng suggested to Li Sheng that Deng Zhi should be the messenger to receive Cao Cao. As for why, Fa explained it like this: "After what happened last time, Deng Zhi and Deng Ai are also familiar in front of Cao Cao and others. For the upcoming full favor, instead of sending a new face, we should send an old face. And this matter can only be done by a person like Deng Zhi who is good at change. ”

"Deng Zhi? This is also a good candidate, Deng Zhi's reputation is very big in the ears of everyone under Cao Cao! Li Sheng thought for a while and laughed: "Then let's let Deng Zhi make this 'yellow cover'?" ”

"Huang Gai? It doesn't count. We only need a gas bag, not a piece of bitter meat. After experiencing Chibi, Cao Cao probably also knew that bitter meat was not delicious. Fa Zheng smiled and shook his head, "But in order to be more secrecy and stability in this matter, before the final result comes out, I think we should not explain the truth to Deng Zhi." After all, Man Chong is also a delicate person, Deng Zhi is still young, no matter how much he pretends to be, I am afraid that under the sophisticated eyes of Man Chong, it will be difficult to hide. This is so important to us that we can't afford to be self-defeating in this matter. ”

"Good!" Li Sheng couldn't help but nod heavily when he heard Fa Zheng's suggestion: "That's the case here." He agreed with a smile, and then continued to discuss some details with Fa Zheng, and then sent someone to find Deng Zhi with a calm face, half angry, half mocking, and gave Deng Zhi the task of receiving Cao Cao's envoy. …… It's up to you whether you want to give them a good look or not. Li Sheng said so.

"Yes......" Deng Zhi lowered his head aggrievedly, and he couldn't feel a little in his heart: "This...... Why is the king so angry, and has sprinkled fire on my head? Is......! Deng Zhi became depressed, but he still went to Hanzhong according to Li Sheng's request. Although he is very smart, but in the face of this kind of headless and brainless thing, he can't think through his mind. Of course, when he appeared in front of Manzhong, the unhappiness in his heart did not disappear. As Li Sheng's courtier, of course he didn't dare to sprinkle this unpleasant feeling on his lord, and he had no choice but to look at the full favor and treat him coldly.

However, Deng Zhi is not one of those people who only knows how to lose his temper but does not know how to do things. Although he was very unhappy with Manzhong because of his mood, he didn't give him a good face, but as a messenger of hospitality, he was still very competent in doing those things of reception. He knew that Man Chong was also confused by the second monk at the moment, and he also understood that the other party was quietly observing him, but he didn't tell the story because he did it on purpose. He is deliberately doing something to make Man Pet feel good, trying to provide his "pleasure" by "abusing Man" Pet Man. This is a very enjoyable feeling, under the full surprise and dare not resist, he seems to be a little addicted, and completely degenerated.

Just like that, Deng Zhi finally received the full favor, and he placed the full favor in the post house. Then he went to see Li Sheng, handed over the order of the reception, and asked his lord: "Your Majesty, he wants to see you, I wonder when you will be free?" ”

"See me?" Li Sheng smiled, and he asked Deng Zhi: "Do you think I should say that it is better to be free or not available?" ”

"I think the lord should meet him quickly. After all, Man's favored eyes are too poisonous, and I'm really worried that the situation on our side will be seen through by him......" Deng Zhi said something that made Li Sheng feel a little surprised, and then paused and said, "...... Even I have never seen such viciousness in Jia Xu and Xun You. ”

"Oh?" Li Sheng asked with a playful smile: "It seems that you have been observing a lot of pets in the past few days, and you have observed quite carefully." What kind of person do you think Full Pet is? ”

"This person is scheming, usually does not talk much, is good at patience, good at thinking, and every word must be to the point. Overall, he can win every war he deserves, and for those who are really embarrassed, he can also minimize his losses as much as possible, he is a bold and resourceful man, and he always pays attention to anomalies when it comes to intelligence gathering, and is a difficult guy to deal with. Deng Zhi said and thought for a while: "I think it is much more difficult to negotiate with him than with Jia Xu and Xun You." ”

"Is that so?" Li Sheng held his chin with his hand, thought for a while, and then said leisurely: "So he is a little similar to Kong Ming." It is best to deal with such a person, increase your strength, and use your strength to oppress him so that he has to surrender, and you can't expect to use those so-called ghost schemes on him. ”

"Hmm. Just follow the usual rules. Deng Zhi said half-echoing, half-suggesting.

"Good! Then you'll leave it to you. The smile on Li Sheng's face became deeper and deeper: "You are now the secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs." It's your responsibility. ”

"I understand." Deng Zhi nodded his head heavily, took the order from Li Sheng and retreated, he knew that his lord Li Sheng had once again entrusted himself with full power in this negotiation, and how to talk about it next was a matter between himself and Man Favor, Li Sheng only planned to meet with Man Pet tomorrow.

Everything went according to the wishes of Li Sheng's side and the hope of pampering himself. On the morning of the second day of arriving at the CD, Man Chong, accompanied by Deng Zhi, met with Li Sheng and exchanged pleasantries, after which Cao Cao and Li Sheng's negotiations began between Man Chong and Deng Zhi. This is the beginning of the fierce confrontation, as for the front, it is basically the praise between each other, except for Cao Cao's official recognition of Li Sheng's discussion and the identity of the Tang King, there is nothing to say, the two sides are just polite over there.

Although it is said that Man Chong is more difficult to deal with than Jia Xu and Xun You, Deng Zhi understands that negotiating with a person like Man Chong is the easiest thing. Because you don't need to talk about any tricks to deal with the full favor, you don't need to set any traps for him in the words, you just need to sit with him generously, and then spread out their hole cards, make a comparison, and calculate what you can get from your advantages. In Deng Zhi's words: "I am talking with Manzhong, and I am talking about the best naked interests." ”

For this kind of negotiation on pure interests, Deng Zhi is really handy. Because he has a lot more cards in his hand than full favor, so man pet has little ability to refute in the face of the conditions put forward by Deng Zhi, except for a few conditions that seem to be indeed involved in Cao Cao's side He did not agree, almost Deng Zhi's request, Man Chong agreed in one breath - this may be because he knows that his side does not have any right to say no.

The negotiations are going smoothly, which can be described as calm compared to the twists and turns of the Xuchang negotiations in the past. After just fifteen days, the negotiated peace treaty was formed: the Tang and Wei armies ceased fighting in time from the date the peace treaty was promulgated; From the date of the armistice, the Tang army withdrew from the territory of the King of Wei, and the border between the two sides was maintained on the boundary line determined in the 23rd year of Jian'an; Cao Cao, the king of Wei, compensated Li Sheng, the king of Tang, with 30 million yuan of money and 1,000 stone of grain; Cao Cao, the king of Wei, allowed Li Sheng to go to the Confucian Mansion in Qufu, Qingzhou, and take a copy back to Yizhou; Cao Cao, the king of Wei, legislated to protect the lives and property of those who did business in his own territory in the future; Tang helped Wei form a merchant fleet and established a treaty of cooperation between the merchant fleet to protect the security of the merchant fleet in the East, South and West Oceans. The merchant fleet of Wei was required to conduct trade in the name of the Han merchant fleet in other cities, and if there was a conflict between the goods sold by the Wei State and the Tang State, the two sides must negotiate and settle the matter, and they were not allowed to sign private agreements with outsiders without authorization.

"It's really an agreement full of benefits." After the document was signed, it was naturally sent back to Xuchang by Man Pet and handed over to Cao Cao, Cao Cao looked at such a thick three-roll bamboo slip in his hand, but he couldn't help but sigh. Although he himself is also a person who values interests, no matter how much he puts interests first, on the surface, he is forced by everyone's pressure to do some grandiose things and say some high-sounding words to cover up his true intentions. He himself was disgusted by such behavior, but instinctively it had become a natural habit. Now he suddenly saw that there was no high-sounding reason, just talking about what I was doing, and what kind of reciprocal conditions you were making, but he was a little unaccustomed to it. After reading the treaty at the moment, he gently put it away, and looked at Man Zhong with a wry smile: "Berning, the treaty you signed is very good, and it is also in line with my heart." But I don't think the words in this treaty can be embellished? If such a thing is made public, I think there will be opposition from the DPRK and China. ”

"How the words on the King's Treaty should be described is our business. When the time comes, just let a person with good writing to touch it up. Speaking of which, the most important thing in the treaty is not the rhetoric of the treaty itself, but the fairness of the treaty, the amount of benefits exchanged for each other, and the comparison of the strength of the two parties to the treaty. Truth be told, a treaty is only effective if the two sides are equally strong. Once the power of the two sides is out of balance, the treaty will naturally be abolished. Full of pets replied to Cao Cao indifferently.

"Drink...... It's quite a new word. The corners of Cao Cao's mouth curled slightly, and he smiled on his face: "The only one who can explain things so thoroughly is Li Sheng's side." However, what they said and the documents they made seemed to be the same thing, that is, they were upright, and there were many bends and curves, which always sounded a little weird. ”

"There's no way around it. The people in Yizhou, from officials to ordinary people, are very busy. None of them seemed to have time to discuss the curves, for they had to make everything clear except for something purely for amusement. "They think of words and language as a tool, a tool to convey information. This kind of thing is neither very elegant nor very vulgar, it is just a necessary thing, and the chopsticks we usually eat and the bowl we use to serve rice, are or are indispensable. For such a necessary thing as language and words, how to express clearly is the most important thing, as for the modification, as for conciseness, it is after the meaning is expressed accurately. ”

"Well, this argument is a bit strange, but it's also a very correct thing to think about. The world's most famous articles almost all meet this criterion. Cao Cao agrees with this statement, because he himself is also the one who writes such articles, but at the moment, Cao Cao's own mind is not going this way, as a lord, he really has more important things to care about than this discussion of language and writing. I saw him smile and ask Man Chong, "Berning, this time you go to Li Sheng's side, you can see all kinds of things about Li Sheng, what do you think is the biggest difference between Li Sheng's people and our people?" ”

"Busy...... The biggest difference between the people on Li Sheng's side and the people on our side is that they are busy. Everything they have is built on the foundation of busyness. Except for a few poor scholars who have always adhered to those so-called landscape poems, from officials to ordinary people, they are all busy. In Yizhou, you really don't see the existence of any idlers. After listening to Cao Cao's question, Man Zhong simply gave Cao Cao a positive answer without saying a word.

"Busy? What is going on over there in Li Sheng? Why are you so busy? Cao Cao became more and more puzzled, and what made him feel particularly strange was: "To say that ordinary people are busy, it's okay." After all, they are all doing this for their lives, but why are the officials under Li Sheng so busy? Is there any difference here? Cao Cao asked curiously.

"Li Sheng's officials have a very different division of responsibilities, and everyone has something specifically responsible. As far as the administrative affairs of a county town are concerned, Li Sheng divided the affairs that were originally the responsibility of a yamen into several yamen to be responsible: basically there are those in charge of administration, academics, justice, city defense, taxation, and so on...... And under these big classifications, there are small classifications, for example, those in charge of administration have the difference between those in charge of agriculture and commerce, and those in charge of infrastructure. Those in charge of agriculture should be responsible for the statistics of the grain sowing situation of the peasants in the area, the taxation of agriculture, and the timely notification of what kind of fertilizer the peasants should buy, and so ......on. In charge of business, it is necessary to negotiate with merchants, deal with disputes between merchants, control the number of merchants, the price of goods sold, the management of commercial taxes and so ......on. It's all trivial. In Li Sheng's words, if you look at the big picture, you will find that you have nothing to do. But if you look at things in a small direction, you will find that those troublesome things are a bunch of piles. Because Li Sheng split the entire yamen into details. The officials under Li Sheng were also responsible for more things, so that those officials seemed busy. Full Favor told Cao Cao his observations.

"That's ......" Cao Cao was silent for a while, nodded honestly, but still a little strange: "With such refinement, there is indeed something to do." But isn't that a nuisance to the people? And the number of officials after the refinement has increased a lot, so the expenses of the officials of the entire country have also increased a lot, although Li Sheng's court has a lot of money, but he is also willing to spend such a cost? ”

"The people do not suffer from the strictness of the law and the heaviness of taxes, but they suffer from the injustice of the law and the injustice of taxes!" Man Zhong said such a warning that he heard from Li Sheng: "There are many officials and rules in Li Sheng's place, but in terms of Li Sheng's income, he is completely able to get enough money and food to pay for these officials' salaries." Unlike we used to think that the source of Li Sheng's wealth was from our own business, Li Sheng's real wealth came from the sea: silver from the Japanese kingdom, copper from the Han Dynasty, poisonous gems and ivory, these are the places where Li Sheng obtained his wealth. In the words of Li Sheng, 'As long as the waters of this sea can keep the ship sailing for a day, then we can increase our wealth for a day.' Heaven and earth are definitely not what we imagined. There is also far more wealth in the world than we know, and whether or not we can find it depends on how brave we are. Now is an era of great discoveries and great adventures, and riding the wind and waves is the true nature of men. 'It is a great thing to boast about being a sailor in Li Sheng, especially in Jiaozhou. And for those great families, having better merchant ships and a larger merchant fleet is the source of their wealth. At this moment, they have long forgotten the fields, and they have forgotten what they have produced on their acres. For them, the income they made from a year's hard work in the fields by the tenant farmers was less than one-tenth of the profit they would have gained by spending half a year on a single voyage across the ocean. The interests of the family were not weakened by the confiscation of their acres by Li Sheng's side, on the contrary, their interests expanded with Li Sheng's support for their trade. After tasting the sweetness of this expansion, their support for Li Sheng has reached another level. ”

"Oh?" Cao Cao seemed very interested in this, and he asked Manzhong: "Then Berning thinks that if we reform ourselves according to Li Sheng's arrangement, it is possible for us to become stronger?" ”

"There is something to learn from Li Sheng, and it is not impossible to become like Li Sheng, but I don't agree that we should completely copy everything from Li Sheng. Because there are always many different situations on Li Sheng's side and the situation on our side, if we ignore this completely, I am afraid that we will destroy everything we are currently under, but we will not get anything. If the lord has to learn from Li Sheng's development to expand his strength, then it is most appropriate to start with the most unobtrusive and most profitable sea trade. Full Favor made such a suggestion to Cao Cao.

"Hmmm......! Let me think again. Cao Cao held his chin and pondered. Man Zhong carefully observed Cao Cao's expression and found that he seemed to care about his statement.