The timing of Tao Ying's recruitment is indeed not appropriate, Xuzhou has just experienced a sharp decline in the population of the war, the population base has been greatly reduced, and it is busy in the spring, there are very few strong men in the countryside who enter the city, and Cao Bao launched the recruitment work ten days in advance, and basically picked out the qualified soldiers, leaving Tao Ying with little choice, waiting for four days in the East Gate Elementary School, Tao Ying recruited less than 300 qualified soldiers.

What makes Tao Ying even more disappointed is that although Tao Ying has come to the recruitment point to call on the people to join the army, but Tao Ying's huge prestige in Xuzhou is unexpectedly not much help for the recruitment work, because the people of Xuzhou are not stupid, although they are grateful for Tao Ying's efforts to save Xuzhou, but it is not a joke to be a soldier on the battlefield, and the incompetence of a general is also to kill thousands of troops, and the remains of tens of thousands of Xuzhou soldiers who were killed by Cao Jun in the Surabaya River have not been completely cleaned up until now. The Xuzhou boy who is interested in joining the army is naturally more willing to join the more stable Cao Bao team, and he is extremely unoptimistic about the fledgling Tao Ying.

After all, Tao Ying's pedantic nerd name was still there, and sacrificing his life to save Xuzhou did not change the impression of the people of Xuzhou on Tao Ying.

Fortunately, Tao Ying still has the name of the second son of Xuzhou to support, although Tao Ying was embarrassed to ask for help, but after hearing that Tao Ying's recruitment was blocked, many Xuzhou civil and military officials and local gentry still took the initiative to help Tao Ying, or took the initiative to send a family member, or went to the tenant farmers on their land to promote Tao Ying, calling on the children of tenant farmers to enlist in the army. Cao Bao, the chief general of Xuzhou, who had already recruited 4,000 recruits as planned, did not care about Tao Ying's refusal to marry, and took the initiative to select 600 experienced veterans and soldiers from the Xuzhou army, and personally sent them to Tao Ying to help Tao Ying form a new army directly under Tao Qian - at least nominally, a new army directly under Tao Qian.

The largest landlord in Xuzhou, Chen Qi and Chen Deng, father and son, sent Tao Ying three hundred recruits, composed of their families, slaves and tenant farmers, Tao Ying happily accepted the help of Chen Qi and his son, but Tao Ying did not accept all the three hundred people, but only accepted the young men between fifteen and twenty years old, and the rest were all returned to Chen Qi and his son, Chen Qi and his son did not say anything, but brought the remaining slaves home with a smile.

For the recruits sent by other Xuzhou nobles, Tao Ying did the same, and chose the recruits between the ages of fifteen and twenty to stay, and the others were returned under various pretexts, only the two hundred house slaves sent by Mi Zhu and Mi Fang, the richest men in Xuzhou, Tao Ying did not accept any of them, and returned them all under the pretext that the recruitment was full.

Of course, Tao Ying understood what the consequences would be if he did this-he greatly offended the Mi Zhu brothers, causing the Mi Zhu brothers, who already had bad intentions towards Tao Ying, to become more and more dissatisfied, and the estrangement between Tao Ying and Tao Ying deepened. But Tao Qian had no extra choice, the Mi Zhu brothers had almost semi-openly sided with Liu Bei, and the soldiers sent by their brothers, even if they did not take on the task of secretly monitoring Tao Ying, Tao Ying did not dare to use these house slaves from the Mi family with confidence, let alone hand over the new equipment that he had been secretly developing to these Mi family slaves. So Tao Ying had no choice but to offend the Mi brothers once.

Tao Ying's distrustful attitude naturally did not hide Mi Zhu's eyes, and after leading the two hundred house slaves from the East Gate School Grounds, as soon as he was far away from Tao Ying, Mi Zhu immediately sneered at his brother Mi Fang and said: "It seems that we all underestimate this Tao Ying child, and we can prevent our brother from inserting eyeliner into his team, which is not stupid." ”

"What are you afraid of him doing? An idiot kid who stinks and doesn't dry up! Mi Fang has always looked down on Tao Ying, and snorted coldly: "Don't talk about Tao Ying's child, even Tao Qian's old son, he doesn't dare to do anything to our brother!" If you really want to turn your face, let's not mention that the remaining remnants of the defeated army in Tao Qian's hands may not be the opponent of our Mi family's private soldiers, Tao Qian Lao'er dares to attack our brother, and Xuande Gong immediately has an excuse to start a war! ”

"Of course, open guns are easy to dodge, but hidden arrows are difficult to defend." Mi Zhu shook his head and whispered to Mi Fang: "Be careful, my brother can send more people to spy on Tao Ying Xiao'er in secret, carefully observe Tao Ying Xiao'er's every move, especially to find out the strength of his new army, how to train, how to fight, and report to me immediately if there is any change." ”

"Eight hundred new troops, what can it do? Why bother my brother? Mi Fang pursed her lips and was very disapprehensive of her brother's fuss, until Mi Zhu stared at her, and Mi Fang, who had always been in awe of her brother, reluctantly replied: "No, please rest assured, my brother must arrange more manpower to keep an eye on Tao Ying'er." ”

Mi Zhu snorted coldly, barely satisfied with his brother's answer, and then Mi Zhu glanced back at the East Gate Primary School behind him, full of doubts in his heart, "Is this Tao Ying child really stupid or fake stupid?" If you are really stupid, how can you think of building an army and leading the army by yourself? If you are stupid, how can you only form such an army? What can be done with just 800 people? ”

Tao Ying was vigilant and vigilant against the Mizhu brothers, and Tao Ying, who had never recruited 800 qualified recruits, hesitated for a moment for the kindness of Cao Bao, the chief general of Xuzhou, and finally nodded to Cao Bao, cheekily accepted Cao Bao's kindness, and decided to select soldiers from Cao Bao's team to supplement his team.

Seeing Tao Ying nodded, Cao Bao, who was eager to have a good relationship with Tao Ying, breathed a sigh of relief, and hurriedly ordered the six hundred elite soldiers he brought to line up on the small school field, and then pointed to the team and smiled at Tao Ying: "Second son, please pick whatever you want, these six hundred brothers are all carefully selected from the main team of Xuzhou by the last general, and they are all the elite of the elite, and most of them are veterans of a hundred battles who crawled out of the pile of dead in the Surabaya War, and the second prince is satisfied." ”

"No, I don't need a veteran." Tao Ying's words were amazing, he didn't even look at the Xuzhou veterans brought by Cao Bao, he shook his head directly and said: "General Cao misunderstood, you brought these veterans, and the little nephew didn't want any of them!" The little nephew wants to choose soldiers from among your new recruits, that is, from the four thousand recruits you have recruited, uncle. ”

"Second son, do you just need a recruit?" Cao Bao's eyes widened at first, and then it suddenly dawned on him - a nerd like Tao Ying, who is stupid in reading, can understand the important surname of a veteran?

"Second brother, why are you stupid again?" Tao Ji also screamed, "Second brother, do you understand military affairs?" If you don't want experienced veterans and elite soldiers, what do you want some recruits for? Without veterans with them, when will the recruits be trained? ”

"Sure enough, it's an idiot! Nerds who don't know anything about military affairs! Lin Qing, who had been delayed for three days before reporting to the army, scolded quietly, and at the same time tried to hide behind the other recruits.

"You know what?" Tao Ying glared at Tao Ji, and said coldly: "Don't look down on the recruits, they are white paper without ink, and jade without carving, I will train them to get twice the result with half the effort!" The veterans are already in shape, and with their own fighting style, retraining will only be half the effort. ”

After scolding his deputy cousin, who had not been convinced, Tao Ying turned to Cao Bao and said, "Uncle Cao, the little nephew knows that you have good intentions, but the little nephew has his own plans, and he just wants his uncle to recruit those new recruits." Also, our Xuzhou army has just been severely damaged by Cao thieves, and its vitality is greatly damaged, if the little nephew takes away the elite soldiers under his uncle's command, it will inevitably affect his uncle's plan to rebuild the Xuzhou army. Therefore, I still ask my uncle to lead my little nephew to those recruits and select some soldiers from them. ”

"Virtuous nephew, don't blame the uncle for relying on the old and selling the old." Cao Bao changed his solemn expression and said solemnly: "There is an old man in the family, if there is a treasure." There are veterans in the team, which can help the recruits get familiar with the military as soon as possible, all of them are recruits, and the team of virtuous nephews is probably not very easy to train. ”

"Thank you uncle for your kindness, of course my little nephew understands this truth, but I still don't have to." Tao Ying shook his head and said with a smile: "The little nephew named the new recruits from his uncle, so he naturally has his own plans, and I hope that my uncle will not hesitate to fulfill them." ”

Tao Ying's attitude was so resolute that Cao Bao, who had no good intentions to repay, had no choice but to sigh and nod in agreement, leading Tao Ying to the North Gate University where the main army of Xuzhou was stationed, and asked Tao Ying to select soldiers from the four thousand newly recruited recruits, and at the same time Cao Bao muttered secretly in his heart, "The second son won't be really a fool, right?" Don't let the veterans sent to the door, why do you want a bunch of recruits who have never been on the battlefield and have never seen blood? ”

"Idiot!" Tao Ji and Lin Qing scolded Tao Ying's back in unison.

With Cao Bao's 4,000 recruits as the base, Tao Ying's choice was much larger all of a sudden, and the result was also natural, Tao Ying's taste was also a lot tricky all of a sudden, many recruits who had actually reached Tao Ying's previous standards were ruthlessly brushed down by Tao Ying, and only recruits who passed Tao Yingxin's selection criteria could join Tao Ergongzi's team.

Tao Ying himself was very happy, but Cao Bao, who was old in military affairs, and Tao Ji, who already had a little military experience, said that they couldn't understand anything, because Tao Ying's new standard was too weird, the recruits must be between fifteen and twenty years old, they must have long hands, they must have bright eyes, and they can have slight looped legs, but they must not have the outer figure-eight legs, they don't like to talk very much, and those who are foaming at the mouth are absolutely not - for this reason, Tao Ying also specifically asked Cao Bao to order the recruits to move freely in order to observe.

What's even more outrageous is that Tao Ying even has to ask the recruit's family history, only those who are innocent can be selected, and those who have done bad things and have a criminal record are not allowed! Especially those folk prodigal teenagers who are called rangers, Tao Ying absolutely not!

Dozens of strong recruits who were favored by Tao Ji were brushed down because they did not pass Tao Ying's political review, Tao Ji finally couldn't hold it back, and directly questioned Tao Ying in person: "Second brother, are you choosing soldiers to go to the battlefield, or are you choosing students to study?" What's wrong with those people I fancy them, what are they about fighting in the township, hurting people, and being rangers? This proves that they are brave! Second brother, do you know that the rangers joined the army, and they are all sought-after elite soldiers there! ”

"Brother Xian is right, being a brother is choosing students." Tao Ying's answer made Tao Ji angry, "What I want for my brother is to be organized and disciplined, not a plate of loose sand, let alone personal heroism!" ”

"Second son, Cao Bao will rely on the old man and sell the old again." Cao Bao also couldn't stand it anymore, and reminded: "No matter how obedient the soldier is, he can't fight on the battlefield, and it's useless." ”

"Uncle Cao is right, but it doesn't matter." Tao Ying replied with a smile: "My father asked my little nephew to recruit eight hundred pro-soldiers, which was originally prepared to be used as a pro-soldier, usually protect my father's car, and help my father catch a few prey when hunting, the chance of going to the battlefield is very small, my uncle thinks, should the little nephew pick a recruit who likes to be obedient, or a recruit who has no force but is disobedient?" ”

"Protecting the vehicle and driving away the prey?" Cao Bao rolled his eyes when he heard this, and said in his heart that you Tao Ying kid recruited troops for a long time to prepare for hunting, and sure enough, the mud couldn't support the wall.

"Second brother, if your team is not ready to go to the battlefield, then ask the second brother to give an order, and let the younger brother return to work under General Cao!" Tauki exclaimed angrily.

Of course, Tao Ying understands that the third brother doesn't want to mix with him, and Tao Ying doesn't really want to keep his cousin, who is not ranked at all in the history of the Three Kingdoms War, but unfortunately Tao Ying is now lacking in talents, and the lack is so serious that he doesn't even have a reliable and usable deputy except Tao Ji, so Tao Ying must not let go of this unlucky cousin, but Tao Ying didn't open his mouth to keep it, or make concessions, just looked at Tao Ji coldly, his eyes were extremely cold.

"Second brother......." Tao Ji was stared at by Tao Ying a little hairy, and remembered that Tao Ying had always been a brother and had done great things that he admired incomparably, so Tao Ji cowered a few times, and finally lowered his head in frustration and gave up the transfer application. Tao Ying ignored him, and went back to continue selecting new recruits.

Of course, Tao Ying understands what he is doing, and he also understands that Cao Bao and Tao Ji have repeatedly opposed it, not intentionally against themselves, but sincerely for their own good, but Tao Ying also has his own hardships and plans. Tao Ying's bitterness is that Xuzhou is a place of four wars, surrounded by enemies on all sides, and the terrain is very open, there is almost no natural danger to defend, difficult to defend and easy to attack. If Cao Bao and Tao Ji were used to build an army, then Tao Ying would have to raise at least 50,000 or 60,000 troops in order to secure the five counties of Xuzhou and guard against enemies from all directions. If you want to expand your territory and dominate the world, there are no 108,000 elite heroes, Tao Yingxiu wants to forge ahead in addition to protecting Xuzhou.

After thinking about it for a long time, Tao Ying, who was almost exhausted in his brain, suddenly found that there was such an army in history, which seemed to be particularly suitable for the terrain and environment of Xuzhou, and could defend the peace of Xuzhou with very few troops. Therefore, from the very beginning, Tao Ying set the goal of the cottage army, and if the cottage army wants to come out, the first important requirement is that there must be a group of disciplined soldiers.

needs a group of soldiers with highly disciplined surnames, Tao Ying naturally will not want those soldiers under Cao Bao's command who have already been mixed in the army, nor will he want those rangers who are idle, brave and lawless all day long.