Xu Shaoan shook his head when he heard this, and said, "The specific person who will negotiate with Chai Rong has not yet been determined. Originally, I thought that my brother meant, and according to the practice of Baoxingzhuang at the beginning, I went to the Houzhou military camp to see Chai Rong on behalf of our brother and make things clear to him. After all, Brother Wei is the most familiar of our brothers, Chai Rong is also the most familiar member of Chai Rong, and it is relatively easier to be accepted by the other party when negotiating with Chai Rong.

However, when the committee discussed this matter, the fifth brother offered to go with me, and said that Chai Rong had previously asked Zhao Kuangyin, who went to Shanhaiguan to 'labor army', to mention to him that he hoped to meet with him in Youzhou City. Considering that Chai Rong was respected as the Son of Heaven, but he could communicate with himself so low-profile, and Zhao Kuangyin was also very sincere when he conveyed this invitation to himself, so the fifth brother gladly accepted Chai Rong's invitation before leaving Shanhaiguan to return to Youzhou, and said that he would go to the Houzhou military camp to meet Chai Rong within five days of returning to Youzhou City.

Although the elder brother, the eldest brother, and the seventh brother all expressed their opposition to the fifth brother's decision, and believed that the safety of the fifth brother was a major issue related to our entire team, and the fifth brother made his own opinions without consulting the brothers, which is not in line with the rules of our team and cannot be counted. However, the fifth brother did not seem to change his decision, but repeatedly emphasized that people should not be untrustworthy, and if our brothers insisted on not letting him go, he would be infamous for not believing in his words. As a result, several committee members argued endlessly over this, and no one was able to convince anyone for a while. In the end, it was Brother Qi who came up with a compromise plan and suggested that this issue be brought to this meeting for discussion by everyone. ”

"Does this need to be discussed? Everyone will definitely not agree to the fifth brother going to see Chai Rong. Zeng Zhilin interjected when he heard this. Yang Xin and Muttel also nodded yes and agreed when they heard this.

Qian Yuanshan said after pondering for a while: "I think there is a certain reason why the fifth brother insists on going to see Chai Rong. ”

"What do you say about Brother Eleven?" Zeng Zhilin asked with some puzzlement.

"That's what I thought." Qian Yuanshan explained, "On the one hand, as the fifth brother said at the committee meeting before, he has promised Zhao Kuangyin, saying that he accepts Chai Rong's invitation and will definitely go to Houzhou Daying to meet him after returning to Youzhou. If he didn't go to see Chai Rong in the Hou Zhou camp, not to mention that he would be looked down upon by the Hou Zhou Junchen, thinking that the fifth brother was a cowardly, greedy and afraid of death, from the perspective of integrity alone, he would not only be ridiculed by the Hou Zhou Junchen, but also be ridiculed by the world. This is not only a great stain on the personal character of the fifth brother, but also has an adverse impact on the future development of our entire team.

On the other hand, the reason why Chai Rong stayed in Youzhou City for more than two months before, and condescended to send his most trusted general to send a message to the fifth brother, expressing his eagerness to meet with him, was to be able to communicate with our brothers, especially the fifth brother, who was regarded by the outside world as the leader of our 'Qingyuan' brothers, in person, so as to solve the problem of the sixteen states of Youyun. If the fifth brother doesn't go to see Chai Rong this time, then for Chai Rong, it will be tantamount to sticking his hot face to the cold ass of our 'Qingyuan' brothers. Such humiliation, said to be a noble emperor, even if it is just an ordinary person, will be resentful. Even if there is a large gap in strength between the two sides now, Chai Rong can't immediately raise troops to retaliate, but he will inevitably find various ways to isolate, embarrass and attack our brothers, which is also quite unfavorable to the development of our team.

Moreover, Hou Zhou Junchen is not a fool, the gap in strength between the two sides is clearly in front of him, and I believe that they will be cautious and think twice before doing anything. Therefore, I think that no matter how unwilling Chai Rong is to hand over the Sixteen Prefectures of Youyun to our brothers, no matter how unwilling the military generals of the Later Zhou Dynasty are to see our brothers and latecomers on an equal footing with them, they will not take risks and risk the lives of themselves and tens of thousands of soldiers. I thought that as long as we made proper arrangements and made sufficient preparations before the fifth brother went, Zhou Junchen would not dare to do anything to the fifth brother after measuring him. ”…,

Speaking of this, Qian Yuanshan paused slightly, his eyes were murderous and cold, and he said viciously: "If Hou Zhou Junchen is really brainless enough to be unfavorable to the fifth brother, then let's let them and the 80,000 horses under them accompany the fifth brother to be buried." ”

Qian Yuanshan's words were recognized by the other brothers, and everyone nodded in agreement.

Just when the relevant topics were almost discussed, Yang Xin finally made up his mind after a long period of hesitation, and asked tentatively: "Since it is very likely that Chai Rong will agree to our conditions, who will finally sit in the position of the envoy of the Youyun Festival who asked Chai Rong to come, and does the committee already have a preliminary candidate?" ”

Xu Shaoan shook his head when he heard this, and said: "The committee has indeed discussed this matter, but like the previous issue, there is no consensus. However, it should be noted that the reason why there is no agreement is not that everyone is there to compete for wanting to be the envoy of this festival, but that they are refusing to recommend others to themselves at the same time. Moreover, the selection of this section envoy is also a major issue related to our entire team. Therefore, the committee decided to bring the issue to this meeting for discussion, and the brothers voted on the candidate for Zuihou. So, when this little meeting is over, everyone will go back and think about it, and vote for your favorite candidate at tomorrow's meeting. ”

Speaking of this, Xu Shaoan paused slightly, and saw that the other brothers nodded their heads in agreement with the way such a festival made the candidates, and at the same time began to think about the candidates they thought were suitable, so he continued: "What should be conveyed has been conveyed, and what should be discussed has been discussed, and we will come here for today's meeting, and all the brothers will go back and think about the topics just mentioned, so that they can vote for themselves at tomorrow's meeting." ”

The closed-door meeting of the Military Department was only one of the closed-door meetings of the various departments that took place in the northern district hall of the "Liangyuan" that afternoon, and the other departments -- several smaller departments were merged together and chaired by Zhang Weixin -- all held similar meetings at the same time to make the necessary preparations for the important meeting that would be close to the nature of a plenary meeting the next day.

On the 19th day of June of the lunar calendar in the ninth year of the Ying calendar (the sixth year of Xiande), the crossing team held the "Summary of the Work of the Eighth Year of the Ying Calendar (the Fifth Year of Xiande) and the Summary Meeting of the Results of the Battle of Youyun" in the "Liangyuan". Since except for a few brothers from the military department who were stationed and could not leave themselves, the other traversers were present to attend the meeting, so this meeting was also called the quasi-plenary meeting by the traversers.

As is customary, the meeting was still chaired by Zhang Weixin. The first part of the meeting was for the heads of each department to summarize the work of the previous year (8 years) and report on the work of this year (9 years) to the participants.

Compared with the previous year, that is, the seven years of the calendar, although a large amount of resources have been invested in the preparation for the war, the development momentum and performance of the crossing team in the eight years of the calendar are still strong, creating a new high since the crossing, and the various preparations for this year's battle of clouds have been completed with quality and quantity, ensuring the victory of the battle of clouds.

However, compared with the great development of all aspects of performance in the past eight years, the expectations of various departments in various indicators in the ninth year of the calendar (six years of Xiande) are much more conservative and cautious. After all, due to the impact of the Battle of Youyun, except for the military department, which will give you a satisfactory answer in next year's work report because of the victory in the war, other departments have been more or less affected by the team's operation system to a wartime state. In particular, the Ministry of Commerce and Trade, because the team invested a large amount of resources (all kinds of equipment, weapons and ammunition, money, grain, etc.) into the war, and the investment in various industries was almost zero, coupled with the large-scale war that made the trade routes impassable and the market withered, the Ministry of Commerce and Trade expected that the economic income of the ninth year of the calendar (the sixth year of Xiande) would be greatly reduced compared with the previous year, and it was likely to return to the level of the sixth year of the calendar (the third year of Xiande) and even the fifth year of the calendar (the second year of Xiande). …,

Although the Ministry of Commerce's poor forecast means that the year-end dividend for each traveler will be significantly reduced by the end of this year, the joy and excitement brought by the victory in the Battle of the Clouds made the travelers not pay attention to the reduction in personal income. First, although the Battle of the Clouds cost the crossing team a lot of materials and money, it also gained a lot. Not counting anything else, the tens of thousands of war horses captured alone would be a huge fortune when converted into silver. Second, with the Sixteen States of Youyun under their control, the annual tax revenue will definitely not be less than the previous annual income of the crossing team. In a sense, the crossing team is also an investment in this battle of the clouds, an investment with a large investment but a greater output. Therefore, a temporary reduction in income is perfectly acceptable for the traversers.

Like the report of the Ministry of Commerce and Trade, the report of the Ministry of Materials Management also shows the situation of ice and fire. In the past eight years (five years of Xiande), various indicator data - mainly the amount of reserves of various materials - have reached a new high, reaching the peak since the team crossed; The expectations of various indicator data in the ninth year of the calendar (the sixth year of Xiande) have dropped significantly, returning to the level of the seventh year of the calendar (the fourth year of Xiande) or even earlier. In particular, the stockpiles of weapons and ammunition, which were vital to the armed forces of the Crossing Brigade, mainly the "Wyvern Army", had shrunk significantly from the beginning of the war after more than two months of large-scale depletion in the Battle of the Clouds.

Among them, the reserve of finished weapons and equipment of various types is only 60 percent of that before the start of the war. The reason for this situation is not that the soldiers do not cherish their weapons, but because of the limitations of the production process, the quality and service life of the various thermal weapons manufactured by the crossing team cannot be compared with the weapons produced in the modern arsenal in the previous life, so the attrition rate in the war is relatively high, and they have to rely on frequent replacement and replenishment of various weapons and equipment to maintain the combat effectiveness of the troops. The reserves of various types of ammunition were less than 40 percent of what they were before the war, and the stocks of artillery shells were less than 20 percent of what they were before the war. With the current ammunition inventory of the crossing team, it is no longer enough to support its armament to fight another war on the scale of the Battle of the Clouds.

At the beginning of the war, the soldiers consumed too much ammunition due to factors such as too little combat experience and nervous tension, and too low a hit rate, and second, because of the limited number of armed forces in the crossing team, especially the number of the "Flying Dragon Army", in order to confront the enemy army that had an absolute advantage in numbers, they had to overcome the enemy's personnel density by increasing the density of firepower, and thus made the soldiers, officers at all levels, and even their commanders -- the crossing crowd -- The overemphasis on giving full play to the superiority in firepower in combat has resulted in a surplus of firepower, especially artillery firepower, and a large amount of ammunition has been consumed in the useless firepower covering tactics.

Although the excessive consumption of weapons and ammunition made the participants a little painful, it was the data on the amount of weapons and ammunition reserves of the Material Management Department that made the participants understand the problems that the crossing team is now facing, so that no one in the subsequent meeting openly proposed that the crossing team should continue to fight, eliminate the group of Hou Zhou troops under Youzhou City, and take advantage of the victory to wave the army south, straight to Kaifeng City - there is no sufficient ammunition support, Even if the crossing team can annihilate the Hou Zhou army under Youzhou City, it will not be able to further expand the results of the battle and bring the entire Central Plains region under their control.

Among the several departments that can quantitatively summarize the work of the team in a year, the Ministry of Science and Technology can be said to be the only department that can maintain the data in the work summary of the nine years (six years of Xiande) and the eight years of the year (five years of Xiande). Because in the face of the Khitan army, which still has a certain strength despite its heavy losses, the crossing team must maintain enough liliang to defend. Coupled with the fact that the relationship between the crossing team and the Later Zhou court is likely to change compared to before the war, the crossing team will have to guard against threats from behind while fighting against the Khitans. This requires the Ministry of Science and Technology to step up production and keep the stocks of relevant weapons and ammunition back to a certain level in order to cope with any unfavorable situation. Therefore, it is reasonable that the production of Jihua in the ninth year of the calendar (the sixth year of Xiande) has not decreased significantly compared with the eight years of the calendar (the fifth year of Xiande). …,

Compared with the reports of the previous departments, the work report of the Military Department can be said to be the most inspiring link. According to the preliminary statistics of the Military Department, in this battle of Youyun, which lasted more than two months, the crossing group armed forces annihilated nearly 300,000 enemies -- more than 150,000 killed and wounded -- and captured nearly 100,000 enemies, while their own losses were more than 800 killed and more than 3,000 wounded -- of which more than 600 were killed or wounded by the "Flying Dragon Army." In this way, including the non-combat forces, the ratio of losses of one's own side to the enemy in this battle reached one to seventy-five, which was an unprecedented victory in absolute terms.

After summarizing the work of the previous year and the battle of Youyun, the Military Department also proposed the work of the second half of the ninth year of the calendar (the sixth year of Xiande) - the expansion of the army. The reason for the military department's request to expand the army is very simple, that is, with the crossing team regaining the sixteen states of Youyun from the hands of the Khitans, the scope of defense that the crossing team needs to defend has expanded from the original "Qingyuan", "Jingyuan", "Liangyuan", "Feilong Village", "Xianglong Fort", new production bases, seaports, salt farms, and industries in various places to all the cities, passes, and strategic points in dozens of counties in 19 prefectures, including Luanzhou, Pingzhou, and Yingzhou in the east. And we must always be on guard against the counterattack of the Khitans. Judging from the current strength of the crossing team armament, it is obviously not enough to defend such a large area, so that many states and counties are still protected by the original defenders, and the crossing team is not stationed there to defend a single soldier. Such a situation is obviously very unfavorable, so the expansion of the army is urgent. As for the specific number of troops to be expanded, the preliminary plan given by the Military Department is to double the number of troops on the existing basis -- among them, the "Flying Dragon Army" will be expanded from the current four regiments to two divisions with complete arms.

Despite the huge expenditure required for the expansion of the military department, the victory at the Battle of the Clouds, which had cost almost an entire year's economic income of the crossing team, which did not include the taxes of the nineteen states, was supported by the overwhelming majority of the attendees, and passed the convention vote.

After making various reports and summaries, the meeting moved on to the next stage -- discussing whether to agree to Wang Kunjun's request to meet Chai Rong in person and who to elect to serve as the so-called envoy of the Youyun Festival.

The participants had a lively discussion on these two issues, and many brothers expressed their views and opinions. The final result of the vote was both unexpected and reasonable.

It was said that it was unexpected because, after listening to the statements of many brothers, including Wang Kunjun, Wang Kunjun's proposal to meet Chai Rong in person, which was not seen by several other members of the committee, actually won the support of the majority of the participants and passed the vote smoothly -- in which Qian Yuanshan's speech with similar content to the closed meeting of the Military Department played a significant role.

It is reasonable to say that it is because after careful consideration and weighing of many parties, the vast majority of the participants chose the most suitable person, Wang Kunjun, whom several other members of the committee unanimously agreed, to take up the post of the supreme governor of the so-called Youyun Jiedu Envoy.

For such a result, Wang Kunjun is mixed. Happily, his proposal to meet Chai Rong was supported by everyone, so that he could fulfill his original promise to Zhao Kuangyin. The worry is that he finally became a candidate for the envoy of the Youyun Festival, and once again became the object of being "burned on fire" - the last time it was Zhang Weixin who tried his best to push him to the position of team leader. The reason why Wang Kunjun has such an idea is, on the one hand, that he deeply feels that as a town, he has a great responsibility, and the scope of his responsibility is no longer limited to crossing the team and a few people attached to this team, but dozens of counties in nineteen states, millions of gentry and people. The slightest carelessness will not only be detrimental to the crossing team, but also affect the livelihood and net worth of millions of people.

On the other hand, the particularity of the organizational structure of the crossing team makes this so-called cloud festival make it subject to many restrictions, and it cannot monopolize and say one thing like other Fangzhen Jiedu, so that it can not let go of its hands and feet and act boldly when formulating and implementing various policies in the region, and it may even appear that the interests of Fangzhen are damaged in order to take care of the interests of the crossing team, thus affecting the image of Jiedu in the minds of the local gentry and even the people of the world. Being such a festival envoy is like dancing with shackles, and that feeling must be quite uncomfortable - of course, the festival envoy has to be subject to the crossing team and cannot monopolize power, which is also the reason why everyone agrees to vote for a festival envoy instead of you competing for the top position.

However, whether it's good or bad, the current traversal team system is like this, and all traversers must abide by it until everyone changes it. Therefore, whether the resolution is in line with Wang Kunjun's wishes or not, he must go all out to implement it, and there is no room for bargaining.