PS: If you want to hear more of your voices and receive more of your opinions, search for the WeChat public account "qdread" now and pay attention to give more support to "Xiao Qi"!

――――――――――――

It is not difficult to see from these two covenants that Liu Biao of the Southern Han Dynasty was sure that Wei would definitely sign an alliance this time, and he decided to eat Wei.

This is a fact on the bright side. Because after the founding of the Western Liang State, the situation of the Northern Wei State will become more and more severe, and it will be surrounded by the Western Liang Army on three sides, and it will have to face a large-scale attack by the Western Liang Army at any time. Therefore, Wei now urgently needs a strong ally, so that he can contain the Xiliang army and dare not act rashly, so an alliance with the Southern Han is his only choice.

There is no other way.

It was precisely because of the current situation that Wei repeatedly urged the Southern Han to send troops as soon as possible in the covenant, and the top priority was to open up a channel of cooperation between them, which was a prerequisite for an alliance between them. The joint capture of Jianghuai is the core issue of the alliance between the two companies.

Only by capturing the Jiangbei counties under the jurisdiction of Yuzhou, Xuzhou and Yangzhou, the two major vassal states of the Northern Wei Dynasty and the Southern Han Dynasty could be regarded as truly gaining a firm foothold, and really occupied half of the country, and then fought against the Western Liang army. Otherwise, the two families will be under the suppression of the Xiliang Army for a long time, separated from the two places, unable to form a trend of north and south, and will be in a strategically inferior position, and the situation will be very passive.

Only by striking first can we turn the passive into the active, and the battle situation will be beneficial to these two major vassal states, so as to gradually encroach on the territory under Li Li's rule, strengthen their own forces, and have the strength to compete with the Xiliang army as soon as possible.

In addition to urging the Southern Han to send troops, the Wei State Covenant also mentioned grain and grass. However, Wei did not ask Liu Biao for grain and grass, but was willing to pay for it. Based on the market price, Liu Biao is willing to sell as much grain. Cao Cao buys as much as he wants, and the more the merrier. Thus. What Pang Tong said was not a mouthful, but he had long known that Wei was short of grain, so he did what he liked, and repeatedly mentioned 100,000 stones of grain and grass. The purpose was to divert Cao Pi's attention and tell him euphemistically that this deal was not a loss for the Wei State, as long as there were 100,000 stones of grain and grass to solve the urgent need, help the Wei State get out of the predicament, and there would be no danger of food shortage.

However, was Wei really short of food? To know. Jizhou is one of the few wealthy counties in the world, and in the past, Yuan Shao could raise 400,000 troops with one state, and fought against the Xiliang army alone for three years. Why is there a shortage of food when it is Cao Cao's turn to take charge of Jizhou? Obviously, the answer is no.

In fact, instead of being short of grain, Jizhou has had a bumper harvest for three consecutive years, the treasury is full, and even many people have surplus grain at home. How can there be a shortage of food in such a situation? This is because Jizhou has a bumper harvest every year. It doesn't mean that the other two states are also good years.

Nowadays, the entire Wei State is indeed short of food, and it is short of food every year, for three consecutive years. As Pang Tong said. In the past three years, the world has been peaceful, and no large-scale wars have broken out, but Yanzhou and Qingzhou under Cao Cao have failed to harvest year after year. Either there was a drought or a locust plague, and the people's livelihoods were struggling. Yan zhòng is short of food. And the reason why these two states and counties continue to suffer disasters is because the Yellow Turban thieves were too bad in the early years. Bandits were numerous, and many people were unable to farm, dragging their families to avoid the scourge of war.

This situation directly led to the barrenness of large areas of land, and the people's living standards fell to freezing point, and when they finally settled down, the first problem the people faced was famine. Since they did not have any savings, they forced the people to eat the seeds distributed by the government as food, and if the seeds were not enough, the harvest would naturally be bad; Coupled with the continuous locust plague and drought, the grain output can be imagined, and the shortage of food is unavoidable. There was a shortage of grain in the first year, and after paying the taxes, there must still be a shortage of grain in the second year, so that after three years, Wei still could not get rid of the predicament of lack of grain.

Therefore, the food of Jizhou alone could not alleviate the famine in the two prefectures and counties. What's more, the so-called bumper harvest in Jizhou, strictly speaking, is a bumper harvest for the major families and powerful gentry, because there are too many princes, generals and families in Jizhou, and nearly sixty percent of the land is private property in their names, and it is exempt from taxation. In contrast, the people of Jizhou can only solve the problem of food and clothing after paying taxes, and the so-called surplus grain is saved from between their teeth, not to mention the extremely limited quantity, and will not be sold. This is their own life-saving food, but they are afraid that the war will start again or the next year's harvest will be bad and they will starve.

There is no panic in the heart of food at home, these people who have experienced the baptism of war know that the troubled times are not over, maybe there will be a war one day, for the sake of insurance, every family saves some food in case of emergency. The common people in the troubled times never expected the government to help them, and they clearly knew that if they wanted to survive, they had to rely on themselves, and if they wanted their families not to starve to death, they had to save more food.

The people did not sell grain, the families and the powerful gentry did not pay taxes, and the grain in the treasury of the Wei State was just full, and it was sold out in the blink of an eye. It is worth mentioning that not all of this grain was used to provide relief to the victims, supply the existing army, and distribute the salaries of hundreds of officials, but about 30 percent of it was used to recruit troops and horses to further expand the army.

Since then, the phenomenon of food shortage in Wei has not been alleviated at all, but has shown an increasingly serious trend. Therefore, the Wei State would try its best to raise grain every year, and buy grain from the merchants and Jingzhou under Li Li's rule through various channels, every year, without exception.

However, more than three years of peace were definitely not given in vain. Although Wei had been short of food, it had a large amount of war materials, including grain and grass for the army. These strategic materials can supply at least hundreds of thousands of troops for a year, or even longer. This is the unspoken rule of the struggle for hegemony in troubled times, and the three major vassal states have their own material reserves to deal with the war that may come at any time.

From this point of view, the purchase of grain from the Southern Han Dynasty for the purpose of preparing for the Great War mentioned in the Wei State Book is purely a pretext, to put it mildly. Wei did not expect Liu Biao in Jingzhou to sell grain at all, but deliberately proposed it to show weakness to the Southern Han regime and express the sincerity of the alliance; The implication is: I have told you all my weaknesses, which is enough to show that my Wei State is sincerely allied with you Southern Han.

However, when Cao Cao wrote the letter of state, he did not expect that the Southern Han side would ask for a sky-high price. took the opportunity to blackmail, and actually opened his mouth with 20,000 war horses and 20,000 sets of cavalry equipment.

So. At this moment, Cao Pi, who came forward to negotiate on behalf of Cao Cao, was completely frightened by the numbers on the Southern Han Covenant and lost his mind for a long time. I was speechless.

After being silent for a long time, Cao Pi's expression gradually returned to normal, the smile on his face disappeared, and he asked Pang Tong in a calm tone: "This covenant must be from Mr., right?" ”

Pang Tong was surprised when he heard this, a flash of brilliance flashed in his eyes, but his face remained the same, and he smiled: "How can you see it?" Why does Ziheng have this idea? It must be known that this national letter will be placed in front of Emperor Wei soon, and Ling Zun will definitely recognize it as my handwritten handwriting from the lord of my family. ”

Cao Pi smiled faintly. Putting the covenant in his hand together on the table shows that he does not intend to sign this covenant, at least not for now, and it is still up for debate. After Pang Tong saw this, his face was still as calm as ever, and he also rolled up the Wei Guoguo book and put it on the table, put it together with the Southern Han Covenant, and looked at Cao Pi with a smile, looking full of confidence. It seems that the victory is in hand.

Obviously, this midnight negotiation has only officially entered the substantive stage at this moment, and the most critical moment has arrived. Although each side has the will to form an alliance, it is a matter of self-interest. No one will agree to the conditions proposed by the other party lightly, let alone give in lightly, and they will not be able to give in the slightest. Every bit is a matter of striving for the best interests for your side as much as possible.

Cao Pi was similarly unresponsive to Pang Tong's actions. His face showed a calmness and calmness that did not match his age at all, which was very different from his previous honest and simple expression. After a little thought. He said calmly: "As far as I know, Uncle Liu Huang of Jingzhou is generous, kind-hearted, erudite, loyal and pure, and has the style of an elder. And this covenant is full of aggressiveness between the lines, and the edge is clear, and there is no mercy or leniency at all, so I have to suspect that this covenant should have been drafted by Mr., and Uncle Liu Huang is just polishing the pen and signing and stamping it on his behalf. Do you think so, sir? ”

Pang Tong smiled slightly, with a noncommittal look on his face, and did not give a positive answer, answering the question: "It doesn't matter who the covenant comes from, what matters is how Ziheng treats this covenant." There is no doubt about the sincerity of my lord's alliance with the Wei State, and the war horses and equipment mentioned in the covenant are indeed problems that my Jingchu army needs to solve urgently. Apparently he acquiesced, and the covenant was indeed his.

"Although Ziheng is young, he is well-informed, how can he not know that my Jingzhou soldiers and horses are good at water warfare but not good at land warfare? In fact, our Jingzhou and Jiangdong armies are not bad at land warfare, but lack cavalry that can fight well, and do not have the ability to run long distances, so their combat effectiveness is greatly reduced, and they can only dominate in water battles, but they cannot fight head-on with the Xiliang iron cavalry.

In comparison, your Wei soldiers and horses are quite strong, the infantry army is particularly elite, and the war cavalry can also confront the Xiliang iron cavalry. The most rare thing is that in the Battle of Jizhou, Wei won a complete victory, captured countless horses, weapons and ordnance, and was fully capable of supporting our Southern Han to form a war cavalry battalion. However, for the sake of fairness, our Southern Han Dynasty will not ask for war horses and cavalry equipment for no reason, and is willing to provide a large amount of money and food as compensation. It's a fair deal, both sides take what they need, and I don't think there's a problem. If Ziheng still has doubts about this, then I have to doubt the sincerity of your Wei alliance. "Self-explosion is short, but it is soft and hard, not without threat.

Speaking of which, Cao Pi didn't plan to go around in circles with Pang Tong, and said directly: "The number is indeed too big, in recent years, our Wei State has formed a large number of cavalry, and there are no so many horses and equipment for a long time. If the gentleman can make full decisions, the money and food will remain the same, and the amount will be halved, and I can reluctantly sign a covenant on behalf of my father. Otherwise, with all due respect, such a large amount is not only something I dare not sign, but even if my father is here, he will definitely not agree. This is a heartfelt statement, please consider carefully, be sure to think about the future and destiny of you and me, and do not ruin the Southern Han Dynasty because of your own thoughts. "On the surface, it is weak, but in fact, it is retreating; At the end of the day, he retaliated with a tooth for a tooth, and in turn threatened Pang Tong. is really worthy of being Cao Cao's son, quite a father's style.

―――――― to be continued―――――――――――――― (My novel "Xiao Qi" will have more fresh content on the official WeChat platform, and there will also be a 100% lottery gift for everyone!) Open WeChat now, click on the "+" sign in the upper right corner to "add friends", search for the official account "qdread" and follow, hurry up! (To be continued......)