In the second year of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty, the beginning of spring. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

The warm sunlight dispelled the clouds and cold that had permeated the winter, and winter left no trace in this world, except for a little white trace that could be found on the distant mountain tops. The river flows, the grass grows, and the warbler flies.

The plan of the year lies in spring, and spring is definitely the best season for China, where agriculture occupies the main position, and it is also the season when farmers are looking forward to the whole cold winter. The day of the beginning of spring is the beginning of the whole spring ploughing, symbolizing the sowing of new hope for the year and carrying people's prayers for a good harvest.

"I still remember that the last time I participated in this spring ploughing ceremony, it was in Xingzhou." Ye Yingwu was only wearing an ordinary Tuanlong black robe, if it weren't for the fact that there were guards inside and outside the Praetorian Guards around him, I am afraid that no one would be able to see that this was the master of the entire Ming Dynasty.

Wen Tianxiang, who was standing beside Ye Yingwu, smiled and nodded. Spring ploughing is the most important thing every year, in the former Song Dynasty, the spring ploughing ceremony will also be personally ploughed by His Majesty the Emperor, sacrificing to the sky, expressing respect for God and praying for a bumper harvest in the new year, for this reason in the Southern Song Dynasty outside the city of Lin'an, there is also a specially opened gossip field, specially used as the emperor to worship the sky and a decent place to plow the land.

This year, His Majesty the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty came to the spring ploughing ceremony in person, if you can see the appearance of the true dragon emperor, it is definitely a thing that can boast to the neighbors for a lifetime, so almost the people in a radius of twenty or thirty miles of Nanjing City have gathered at the foot of this Zhong Mountain.

Lingxiu Zhongshan Mountain, originally the most important place of worship outside the capital city of Nanjing, the Temple of Heaven of the Ming Dynasty and the martyr's shrine of the dead soldiers, the martyr's cemetery are all on this Zhong Mountain, along the mountain body, it adds a bit of sacredness to Zhongshan Mountain. And the spring ploughing ceremony, which is the most important part of the year's sacrificial activities, is naturally also under this Zhong Mountain, because both the people and the court officials believe that the aura and protection of Zhong Mountain can make them live a happy life and harvest the land in the coming year.

As time passed, the people had gathered more and more, and the Nanjing government had to send officials to maintain order in the various specially opened spaces.

Looking at the dense crowd of people around him, a smile appeared on the corner of Ye Yingwu's mouth.

When people go to a higher position, turn their heads to see the hard work of the year, they will naturally be full of emotion, Wen Tianxiang is accompanied by Ye Yingwu all the way, listening to Ye Yingwu talk about the spring ploughing ceremony in Xingzhou, for a while he was also a little fascinated.

At that time, Ye Yingwu had just won the battle of Xiangyang, although he was full of spring breeze, he was far from being an important figure in the entire former Song court, and even Jia Yidao was still thinking about how to deal with Jiang Wanli, who was becoming more and more unruly, instead of shifting his attention to this young man. At that time, Ye Yingwu and they discussed at the spring ploughing ceremony how to mobilize more people to dig a reservoir for Xingzhou, and now they only need to say one sentence to decide the life and death of tens of millions of people.

After a long journey, I have finally come to the present.

Ye Yingwu stood with his hands in his hands, looking at the people who were busy arranging the venue of the Spring Ploughing Ceremony, and a smile appeared on the corner of his mouth unconsciously: "But after so many years, the distance between me and these people has not changed much. ”

Wen Tianxiang was slightly stunned, and also nodded and chuckled. Ye Yingwu always values the people, which is well known to the officials in the court, and it is also a happy thing for Ye Yingwu to be able to keep such a close distance from the people this time.

The two bigwigs in front of him let out a heartfelt smile, and the prefect of Nanjing Mansion, who was carefully following behind him, also breathed a sigh of relief, and his face was happy, explaining that his arrangement today was very much in line with His Majesty's thoughts.

"The snow disaster relief and reconstruction in Shandong Province has been almost carried out, and with Lu Junshi personally in charge, there is a lot less verbosity and trouble in communicating with the imperial court." Ye Yingwu said with a smile, "And this time the snow disaster has caused a large number of displaced people, many of whom are young and strong laborers, and the two Huai armies just took this opportunity to make up for the gap in the first brigade a lot, so that the two Huai armies are recovering at a speed beyond our expectations, and may really be able to re-become a full-fledged main force within this year." ”

Wen Tianxiang nodded: "More importantly, the battle of Hecai Town undoubtedly provided the best training experience for the two Huai armies, this kind of hard battle and encirclement battle in bad weather was originally very capable of training the long-distance attack ability of a main army and the ability to defend to the death, and now the Mongolian Tatars are insufficient, and if they want to fight such a battle of encirclement and annihilation, there are really not so many opportunities." ”

"It's just a little more sacrificed." Ye Yingwu sighed softly, "They are all good sons of the Ming Dynasty, and I don't want to watch every family wear linen and filial piety." Years of war, not only made the population growth of the Ming Dynasty slow, but also made a lot of young laborers go out, leaving only the widows, the old and the weak, and if this continues, the Ming Dynasty will sooner or later face the dilemma of insufficient labor. ”

What Ye Yingwu said is the truth, in fact, since the former Song Dynasty Duanping entered Luo, the war has not subsided for more than 20 years, and a large number of young and strong laborers died on the battlefield, resulting in many people who broke their families, but because the foundation of the former Song Dynasty was very thick for three hundred years, it was not embarrassing for a while. However, Rao is like this, and Ye Yingwu has also been implementing the strategy of elite soldiers, so as to reduce the deployment of young and strong civilian labor as much as possible.

However, with the Ming Dynasty has been fighting with the Mongols on various fronts, as well as the immigration of Nanyang and Heluo, the Ming Dynasty now seems to be very lacking in young and strong labor, so that more than two months have passed, and the gap between the two Huai armies in the battle of Hecai Town has not been filled, after all, even if the imperial court wants to recruit soldiers, it has to consider the recent spring ploughing.

Even the canal dredging project, the construction of the southern straight road, and the large-scale expansion project of the Liujiagang shipyard that are being carried out in the Ming Dynasty are all based on Mongolian prisoners of war and Nanyang slaves as the main laborers, while the local Han people of the Ming Dynasty only appear as overseers.

"Now the Ming Dynasty has the Hexi Shence Army, the Guanzhong Tianxiong Army, the Heluo Tianwu Army, the Shandong Lianghuai Army, and the Gaoli Town Navy on the northern front, but each army is more or less at war with the Mongol Tatars, and the number of soldiers is varied, and it is estimated that there should be about 250,000 troops in total." Ye Yingwu said in a deep voice, "In addition, with the Jinghu Army that is preparing to enter Heluo and the Dali Army and Jingjiang Army that serve as the second line, the Northern Expedition troops that the Ming can use should be around 350,000 to 400,000. ”

"Your Majesty thinks the number is still not enough?" Wen Tianxiang frowned suddenly, as the left prime minister of the Ming Dynasty, even if he was not the head of the household, he naturally knew how many folk Ding Zhuang there were in the Ming Dynasty, "But now that the Ming Dynasty has been consumed by several wars, I am afraid it will be difficult to ······ among the people."

Ye Yingwu glanced back at Wen Tianxiang and said lightly: "There are still two teams, one is the Dongying Army that is being formed, and the other is the Praetorian Guard Army around me. ”

"Can the Dongying Japanese and the Goryeo people afford the heavy responsibility of the Northern Expedition?" Wen Tianxiang was suddenly a little surprised, Daming had a Jingjiang army dominated by Nanyang soldiers, and there was already a lot of criticism in the government and the opposition, and now His Majesty was going to form a new army dominated by Dongyang soldiers, Wen Tianxiang didn't know how to answer the pressure from below.

After all, in the hearts of many people who claim to be Confucians, the credit for such a major event as the Northern Expedition is not enough for their own Han people, so why should outsiders mix it up. What's more, there is a difference between Yi and Han, how can the Ming Dynasty pin the hope of victory on these barbarians.

Ye Yingwu said in a deep voice: "As long as you tell them what they are fighting for, I believe they can even do better than the Ming soldiers." Song Rui, have you forgotten the Jingjiang army in Chengdu City at that time, those Zhenla and Annan people fought no less bravely than the Sichuan and Shu army. ”

Wen Tianxiang was slightly stunned, what Ye Yingwu said was the truth, because for the people of these nationalities, if they want to find a way to survive under the enslavement of the Ming Dynasty, the best way is naturally to join the Ming army, and exchange the identity of the Ming people for the whole family through their real military exploits. It is precisely because of such attractive conditions that the Zhenla people and Annan talents in the Jingjiang army at that time desperately rushed forward to the peak, and the facts proved that Daming did not treat them badly, and all of them were implemented according to the previous agreement, which also made the Nanyang natives more active in signing up to join the army, and soon made the Ming Dynasty reorganize the two main armies in Nanyang, so that the Xuanwu Army could be transferred north at any time.

With these examples of Nanyang natives, those Oriental Japanese and Korean people will naturally not be left behind, after all, military merit is limited, and it is not known when it will take time for others to snatch themselves. What's more, Goryeo and Japan in the East are the regions most deeply influenced by Chinese culture, and the people there are naturally more likely to identify and yearn for the Ming Dynasty, so as long as Ye Yingwu makes a decision and the military department below has no objections, I am afraid that the Ming Dynasty will soon be able to rely on the East Ocean to pull up one or two main armies, don't look at a main army of 50,000 people, the number is not much, but you must know that after so many years of bloody battles, there are only six or seven main armies that the Ming can handle, and the situation on the Mongolian side is even more miserable. After all, Mongolia is even involved in internal contradictions, so the number of troops has long been seriously insufficient, otherwise a large number of ethnic groups such as the Bohai people and the Jurchens who had been massacred by Mongolia would not have been recruited into the army.

Compared with the cannon fodder used by the Jurchens, Bohai people, and Tang Wuren on the Mongolian side, it is obvious that the quality of the cannon fodder on the Ming side is much higher, and it is equipped with advanced firearms of the Ming Dynasty for formal and systematic training.

Nowadays, with the expansion of the Ming Dynasty and the continuous cultural, military, economic and trade influence on the surrounding vassal states and conquered lands, the Ming Dynasty has an incomparably strong control over the surrounding areas. Now the suzerainty of the Ming Dynasty is no longer a suzerainty that was bought with money like the former Song Dynasty just to let Annan and other clowns not cause trouble, but a suzerainty that can really control the armies and even the regimes of the surrounding vassal states. This is why Ye Yingwu is confident that he will be able to carry out the Northern Expedition this year or next year.

The issue of soldiers, which the government and the opposition are most concerned about, is precisely the easiest to solve or actually solved here by Ye Yingwu.

Seeing Ye Yingwu standing there with a smile and his hands in his hands, Wen Tianxiang felt a lot of emotion in his heart. He didn't know how much effort and energy Ye Yingwu had spent on such a big game, and even if it weren't for the approach of the Northern Expedition, so that Ye Yingwu didn't have to hide his hole cards, I'm afraid that Wen Tianxiang would still be worried about Ding Zhuang and the soldiers who were lacking in the Ming Dynasty.

Thinking of the opposition voices of the government and the opposition when Ye Yingwu went to Nanyang at that time, Wen Tianxiang couldn't help but sigh from the bottom of his heart. At that time, many ministers objected because they did not see as far as His Majesty after all, and even the ideological realm of the two sides was not at the same level at all.

Wen Tianxiang didn't know that this was more because Ye Yingwu had more than seven hundred years of experience, especially the change of four dynasties in these seven hundred years, which allowed Ye Yingwu to gain more experience and lessons. But Wen Tianxiang knew very well that under Ye Yingwu's palm, Da Ming would inevitably achieve the final victory of the entire Northern Expedition in the most amazing way.

The dream of three hundred years has never been so close to the end that it is almost within reach.

And who would have thought that just a few years ago, this would have been just a distant luxury.

The salute sounded, and Wen Tianxiang turned around and arched his hand: "Please also ask Your Majesty to preside over the spring ploughing ceremony." ”

A huge spring cow has been carried out by hundreds of big men, and when the people saw this huge spring cow, they broke out into enthusiastic cheers, which spread from the foot of Zhongshan Mountain to the city in the distance.

The high platform that had been built a long time ago stood there, and Ye Yingwu slowly walked to the stage.

Lu Wanyan, who was dressed in a vermilion dragon robe, was already standing there, and when she saw Ye Yingwu coming, she slowly greeted her: "Concubine see Your Majesty." ”

Ye Yingwu nodded, and the queen mother was in front of her, and the surrounding Praetorian Guard soldiers and Wen Tianxiang and other officials also bowed respectfully and retreated. Ye Yingwu stretched out his hand and gently held Lu Wanyan's hand, the slender jade hand was a little cold, Ye Yingwu said helplessly: "The spring is cold, and it is really hard to stand outside." ”

"Husband, what are you talking about!" Lu Wanyan suddenly snorted, "The concubine is not only the eldest lady of the Ye family, but also the queen of the Ming Dynasty, and she should do her duty in her position, this spring ploughing ceremony should have been the Son of Heaven and the queen to jointly hammer and crush the spring cow, if the concubine is not there, how should the government and the opposition talk about it?" ”

Ye Yingwu nodded again and again with emotion, but Lu Wanyan chuckled and said: "All the people are here, you should let it go, otherwise let others see it, what kind of system will it be." ”

"Anyway, there are quite a few people who have seen it." Ye Yingwu replied solemnly, "What's more, you and I step forward hand in hand, which can better reflect the harmony of the Ming royal family, the harmony of the emperor and the queen, and the world is worry-free, wouldn't it be better." ”

Lu Wanyan frowned slightly, but after all, she didn't withdraw her hand, just moved forward slightly side by side with Ye Yingwu, and then said in a voice that only the two of them could hear: "What Husband is best at, I'm afraid it's such serious nonsense." ”

Rolling his eyes, Ye Yingwu didn't bother with his own lady, and the two walked slowly onto the high platform hand in hand. Seeing the figure of the emperor and queen appear, thousands of people and the Praetorian Guards under the high platform knelt on the ground at the same time, bowing three times and bowing nine times.

At this time, His Majesty the Emperor is the embodiment of the sky, and he deserves the three bows and nine bows.

"Long live my emperor, long live the Ming Dynasty, long live, long live!" I don't know how many people are shouting loudly, wave after wave of shouts slapping head-on. Whether it is the soldiers of the Praetorian Guard, or the officials of the Nanjing Prefecture, or even the people below who are oppressive, they are all shouting loudly with all their might. One by one, the figures bowed down in unison, like the waves of the sea.

Far and near, it was as if the whole world was shaking in the sound of this long live, as if the whole world was bending down to the young man in a dragon costume standing on the high platform.

As the sound gradually subsided, the heaven and earth were quiet again, as if something blocked the outside world and the spring ploughing ceremony venue at the foot of Zhong Mountain, so that all the people here had no way to make a sound, so they could only prick up their ears and listen to the orders of the person on the high platform.

"All the people are flat!" In the silence and solemnity, Ye Yingwu's voice was extremely loud.

Countless figures slowly stood up, and one by one their eyes fell on the high platform, and also on the Dragon and Phoenix Emperor.

Ye Yingwu and Lu Wanyan reached out at the same time to pick up the hammer on the plate, but Ye Yingwu seemed to be deliberately half a beat slower, and when Lu Wanyan's hand fell on the wooden handle, his hand happened to fall on Lu Wanyan's hand. Once again, shield her from the cold outside. Regarding her husband's warm little action, Lu Wanyan was warm in her heart, but she turned sideways slightly, revealing a hint of a smile.

It's as if the spring breeze melts the ice and awakens the sleeping life.

It is as if the dawn light pierces the darkness and brings the warmth of the day.

The two stood on the high platform and smiled at each other, then slammed the hammer down.

Countless cracks climbed up the back of the spring cow, and soon the entire spring cow was cracked into pieces.

The entire Zhongshan was once again drowned out by cheers. (To be continued.) )