The time has passed, the night is getting deeper and deeper, the entire Jinyang Palace is already silent, the palace gate is also closed, only a group of patrol soldiers patrol the provincial platform from time to time.

The buildings of the provincial platforms are dark and very quiet, but the lights are still on on the third floor of Ziwei Pavilion, which is the official residence of the King of Chu, which shows that the King of Chu is still in the Ziwei Pavilion.

This made the patrolling guards even more careless, more than 300 people specially guarded around Ziwei, in their memory, it seemed that His Royal Highness the King of Chu had not stayed so late, what happened today?

Yang Yuanqing is indeed a little worried today, at the beginning Pei Ju said that his biggest weakness is that the defensive line is too long, from Liaodong in the east to Helan Mountain in the west, in fact, not only Helan Mountain, but also the more distant Hexi Corridor, Dunhuang, Yiwu, that side is also his territory.

Today, he deeply felt the deep meaning of what Pei Ju said, when the steppe Turkic Hu cavalry gradually regained its strength, his vast border became a great burden, and the flexible Turks could attack Liaodong, Youzhou, Yandai, Fengzhou, and even cross the greedy mountains to attack Dunhuang and Yiwu.

To defend such a long border, he needs at least 300,000 troops, but he is far from being able to take out 300,000 troops to defend the northern border, not even 100,000 troops.

Since ancient times, the nomads in the north have always been the number one enemy of the farming peoples in the Central Plains, from the destruction of the Western Zhou Dynasty to the entry of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, the figure of the nomads has never disappeared in the land of the Central Plains.

Wherever the nomads passed, killing and looting, population extinction, the history of thousands of years of Han civilization is actually a history of resisting the invasion of northern nomads.

But the Han civilization was not completely on the defensive, Qin, Han Dynasty, Cao Wei, Sui and Tang, Ming, large-scale defensive counterattacks were repeatedly visible, so what about him Yang Yuanqing?

In terms of origin, he, like Tang, also inherited the mantle of the Sui Dynasty, which had a strong army. Using the two-handed strategy of Huairou and the big stick, the steppe wolf was tamed.

However, the Sui Dynasty was not able to eradicate the Turkic roots, but after the Sui Dynasty weakened, the Turkic Qimin Department that it supported quickly showed its hideous fangs and pounced on their former benefactors, which can only show the failure of Huairou's methods and show that the Sui Dynasty did not see through the wolf nature in the bones of the Turks.

He, Yang Yuanqing, must not repeat the mistakes of the past, although Yang Yuanqing has already formulated a long-term strategy to deal with the Turks. But how can the current crisis be resolved? He can be like Toyosu. Use the whole army to deal with the Turks, but what about the Tang Dynasty?

Yang Yuanqing sighed, he also had to be glad about his decision at that time. Keep Dou Jiande in Qingzhou, otherwise he will now face Li Wei in the east and Li Tang in the west. There are also Turkic wolves behind them, surrounded by enemies on three sides, and the Sui Dynasty is really in danger.

Now at least he doesn't have to worry about the East, with Dou Jiande blocking Li Mi for him, he only needs to think about the Tang Dynasty and the Turks now.

The only thing he was worried about now was that he would be attacked by the Turks and the Tang Dynasty at the same time, but after he successfully ambushed the Turkic envoys, it was unlikely that the Tang Dynasty and the Turks would conspire to attack the Sui.

But if he goes to war with the Tang Dynasty, will the Turks take the opportunity to attack Mayi County? Or he went to war with the Turks. Will the Tang Dynasty take the opportunity to attack Guannai?

It's entirely possible, even ninety percent likely, and if so, how should he deal with it?

Yang Yuanqing has been thinking about this problem during this time, he originally thought that the Turkic threat could be solved after winter, but God seemed to be against him, tomorrow will be November. There was still no snow in the steppe, and there was no heavy snow to stop it, and the Turkic cavalry appeared north of Fuqipo.

Now Yang Yuanqing has no choice, and the Turkic cavalry patrol has broken through the northern border from time to time and entered the Sui border to attack the rest of Utu. When the threat of war came, he had to stabilize the Tang Dynasty first. Then concentrate forces against the Turks, and after defeating the Turks, then turn around and clean up the Tang Dynasty.

At this time, there was a faint neighing of war horses in the night, which came from outside the gate of Jinyang Palace, and it was heard very clearly in the dark night, and then the small door of Jinyang Palace opened a crack, and under the faint light, three figures followed the guards into the palace.

Yang Yuanqing's spirits perked up, he saw very clearly, the figure of the person in charge should be Wei Ben, has it only been more than an hour to solve the problem?

The person came closer and closer, sure enough, it was Wei Ben, the two entourages behind him carried a box, Yang Yuanqing smiled with satisfaction, although this Wei Ben was a little less predictable, but his ability to solve problems was really strong, originally he was still thinking about replacing Wei Ben, but now Yang Yuanqing temporarily put down this idea.

Wei Ben entered the Ziwei Pavilion, and not long after, his footsteps appeared outside the door, and Pei Qingsong reported: "Your Highness, General Wei is here!" ”

"Come in!"

Yang Yuanqing turned around, the door opened, Wei Ben walked into the official room quickly, with an excited face, behind him, two guards carried into an iron box, Wei Ben knelt down on one knee, and said loudly: "Your Highness Qiqi, you are humble and worthy of your mission!" ”

"General Wei has worked hard!"

Yang Yuanqing approvingly comforted him, walked to the tin box again, kicked the tin box with the tip of his boot, and made a dull sound, "Is this fake money?" Yang Yuanqing asked with a smile.

Wei Ben hurriedly opened the box, and it was indeed a box of fake silver coins with white flowers, Yang Yuanqing reached out and grabbed a handful, and the silver money slipped from the gap between his fingers and fell on the pile of silver coins, making a clanging sound, he nodded and asked, "How many are there?" ”

"Back to Your Highness, there should be a total of 10,000 pieces, but today they used 1,000 pieces, and now there are 9,000 pieces in the box."

Yang Yuanqing nodded, "Tomorrow you will find a way to recover the thousand fake silver coins you have used, and recover them as much as possible." ”

"Ignorance, understood!"

Wei Ben took a stack of documents from the guards, and presented them to Yang Yuanqing with both hands, "These are some important documents found in the Bafang Liquor Shop, please take a look at them." ”

Yang Yuanqing took the document and flipped through it, there was Tang Feng's bribery record, Tang Feng's various strongholds in the Sui Dynasty, and the list of Tang Feng's main backbone personnel.

Yang Yuanqing looked at the bribery records quietly, there were twenty-three officials, and the highest was only a six-rank official, this Li Shouzhong was really an incompetent person.

Wei Ben bowed down and said, "I plan to do it overnight tonight, and use one night to arrest all the criminals." ”

Yang Yuanqing pointed to the twenty-three Sui officials who had taken bribes, "Don't move these officials for the time being!" ”

"Yes! Humiliation remembered. ”

Yang Yuanqing took the list of Tang Feng members again, he pondered for a moment, and handed it to Pei Qingsong casually, "Copy a copy!" ”

Pei Qingsong took the list and walked out quickly, Yang Yuanqing paced back and forth in the room with his hands behind his back, thinking about how to deal with this matter and exterminate the Taiyuan Tang Feng. The Tang Dynasty will inevitably send new people, and they have to find a way to leave a little clue.

Thinking of this, he asked Wei Ben again, "Tell me what happened!" ”

Wei Ben told Yang Yuanqing in detail about the process of their extermination of the Bafang Liquor Shop, and Yang Yuanqing pondered for a long time and said: "Don't arrest the other members of Tang Feng anymore, kill Li Chongshou and the other captured people, and go back to create an illusion." Burn down the fifth floor of the liquor store at dawn. Then a large number of internal guards were mobilized to surround the liquor store, and their bodies were lifted out of the liquor store to create some momentum. Let the onlookers be a little more, do you know what I mean? ”

Wei Ben thought for a while, and suddenly understood. "His Royal Highness means that let Tang Feng and the others think that Li Chongshou did not betray them, and all the lists have been burned, so the Tang Dynasty will still have one or two backbones, which will leave us a handle in the future."

Yang Yuanqing smiled and nodded, "That's what it means, you guys go for it!" ”

"Your Highness, please rest assured, everything will be taken care of."

In fact, Yang Yuanqing only needs to give a directional instruction, and everything will be handled by the Internal Guard. Yang Yuanqing didn't need to worry about this, Wei Ben knew what to do, he bowed and retreated, but Yang Yuanqing stopped him again, "Wait a minute!" ”

Wei Ben stopped, turned around and saluted: "Please instruct Your Highness!" ”

Yang Yuanqing pondered. Said slowly: "Use the eagle letter to send a message to the Chang'an Intelligence Hall, and let them find a way to convey it to Yang Shidao, saying that the Sui Dynasty will make the greatest sincerity, completely cancel the issuance of silver coins, and at the same time close the silver mine in Huining County." ”

Wei Ben was shocked. He didn't understand why Yang Yuanqing would make such a big concession to the Tang Dynasty, and was it necessary to show weakness to the Tang Dynasty? But he didn't dare to ask more. He bowed and bowed, and slowly retreated.

At this time, Pei Qingsong walked in and handed the copied list to Yang Yuanqing, Yang Yuanqing looked at it, put it on the table casually, and he wrote a warrant, ordering the Huining Silver Mine to be closed immediately, and all the miners to temporarily withdraw to the camp of Chitie Mountain.

He handed the warrant to Pei Qingsong, "Use the eagle letter to pass it to Pei Xingyan!" ”……

At this time, the gate of the North Market had just opened, and the fire ignited by the Bafang Wine Store suddenly alarmed the shops and neighbors of the wine stores in the North City.

Everyone rushed to put out the fire with water, but the scene in front of the wine store stunned everyone, only to see more than a thousand internal security soldiers surrounding the wine shop, and more than a dozen corpses were carried out from the wine store, they were not burned to death, but their bodies were full of arrows, and they were covered in blood.

One of them was Li Shouzhong, the proprietor of the Bafang Wine Shop, who was also killed with a knife, and a war knife pierced his chest, lying on the cold ground, dead without blinking his eyes.

The internal guard soldiers were busy fighting the fire, and no one seemed to pay attention to the dead people, so they were thrown in the open space outside the liquor store, and a large group of people were discussing the true identity of Li Shouzhong, how could he be killed by the internal guards?

Wei Ben was still standing on the second floor of the Yuan'an Liquor Store, staring at Li Shouzhong and more than a dozen other corpses, watching every move of the people around him.

At this time, a thin man quietly approached Li Shouzhong, he squatted in front of Li Shouzhong's corpse, as if he was checking the wound, but taking advantage of the unpreparedness, his hand reached into Li Shouzhong's waist and quickly took off a bronze medal from his waist.

All this fell into Wei Ben's eyes, and he turned his head and asked his subordinates, "Who is that thin man?" ”

The subordinate stared for a moment and replied: "He is the shopkeeper of the Shushan Tea Shop in Beishi, called Zhao Wenzhong, he is ranked seventh on the list, and the Shushan Tea Shop is also a branch of Tang Feng." ”

Wei Ben nodded, Tang Feng's people really came, and he immediately ordered: "Don't care, everything is up to him." ”

Wei Ben hurriedly walked downstairs and came to the gate, and a soldier stepped forward to report: "General Qiyu, the fire on the fifth floor cannot be extinguished, and it has all been burned down." ”

"You fools!"

Wei Ben scolded the soldiers for being incompetent, looking very anxious, and the corner of his eye quickly swept to Zhao Wenzhong just now, and found that he was not far from him, staring thoughtfully at the fifth floor that was completely engulfed in flames.

The corners of Wei Ben's mouth showed an imperceptible, smug smile