"Wait."

Just as Wei Ran was about to leave, the old mayor stopped him again and waved his hand to let the middle-aged scribe beside him leave.

"What else does the mayor command?" Wei Ran asked.

After a moment's hesitation, the old mayor spoke, "You don't understand why I didn't let you go to the bandits?" ”

"Yes." He Wei Ran has always been puzzled by this.

"Then let me ask you, do you know how many of these bandits there are?" The old mayor cleared his mind.

"According to the report of the spies and the information from the surrounding homeless people, there are about four or five hundred people, a top small cottage scale." When it comes to professionalism, Wei Ran is very sober.

"How's the combat power?"

"It's strong, not even worse than what we were trained in our regular barracks." Wei Ran frowned.

"Then how much time do you think it will take us to exterminate these bandits, and how many people will be dispatched? How many more people will be lost? ”

"The bandits have a good location, and they are not afraid of death. To completely wipe it out, it would take at least a thousand people, and ideally a head-to-head confrontation. If the mountain is attacked head-on, more manpower is required, and at least two or three hundred men are lost. As for time, two days would be feasible at any cost, and that would be a bigger loss. Wei Ran calmly analyzed.

"Then do you know how many troops we have in Aoshan Town, and how many people do we have?"

"The total number of troops is 3,128, and as for the population, it is about fifteen or six thousand."

"Aoshan Town is only a medium-sized town, with a full population of 20,000 people, and the maximum force that the City Lord's Mansion allows us to have is 4,000 people (in fact, it is a system function). Feeding an army of more than 3,000 people with 13,000 inhabitants is already struggling. Aoshan Town was originally established for bandits, many years of war, itself is not rich, if a loss is too much, what do we use to compensate the dead, and what do we use to recruit new troops, how many people are left to feed these troops? Even if they are re-recruited, how long will it take to match these well-trained veterans? "The old mayor is more realistic than the other.

"Then we can't let it go, can we?" Wei Rannuo said, he really didn't have the energy to think about this, but he felt that what the mayor said made sense, "Why don't we recruit more homeless people, reach the population limit, and even upgrade to a large town!" ”

The old mayor sighed secretly again, why is this kid so unenlightened! But he still picked up the topic: "Let me ask you, how many people are there in Aoshan City today, and what are the troops?" How many towns are there under it, what is the population, what is the strength of the troops? ”

Wei Ran was stunned, what does this have to do with the bandits? But he still thought about it quickly and said: "Aoshan City now has about 200,000 people, 30,000 or 40,000 troops, and has 7 subordinate towns, including two large towns, three medium-sized towns, and two small towns. The two large towns have a total population of 50,000 and a military strength of about 10,000, while the other two medium-sized towns have similar populations and troops to our town, and the two small towns together have less than 10,000 people and less than 2,000 troops. But none of this has anything to do with the bandits we're talking about! ”

"It has nothing to do with bandits, but it has something to do with our Aoshan Town. Do you know the pattern of Aoshan City more than ten years ago? The middle-aged mayor asked again.

"I don't know that?" Wei Ran was a little naïve, at that time he was only in his 20s, an intermediate general, thinking about practicing martial arts all day long, and he didn't pay much attention to other things.

"More than ten years ago, when Aoshan City was at its strongest, it was close to 500,000 people, with a military strength of nearly 100,000, and it had nine subordinate towns, including 5 large towns and 4 medium-sized towns. Moreover, these nine towns are all the ones that have developed to the top, and that time was the most glorious time for Aoshan City. But now? A war destroyed Aoshan City, and the change of city lord made Aoshan City even worse. ”

"I know this, I also participated in that war, if it weren't for the accumulation of training on the battlefield in those years, I'm afraid I haven't broken through the first-order generals until now."

"But you don't know that the war, though it was protracted, destroyed only one large town, and only two of the four medium-sized towns. Although the population and military strength of Aoshan City decreased greatly after the war, there were still four large towns and two medium-sized towns. But now there are only two large towns, don't you think it's strange? The old mayor asked, a little embarrassed in his tone.

"yes, why? I remember that a few years ago, it seemed that there were still four big towns, and I don't know when two suddenly disappeared! Wei Ran was a little confused.

The old mayor is a little ironclad, and as the highest military commander of a town, he even ignores such an important matter. But fortunately, he understood the personality of his nephew, and still explained: "Because of the other two large towns, a few years ago, one was forcibly relegated to a medium-sized town, and the other was destroyed by the city guards. You've heard of that, right? ”

What made him angry was that Wei Ran scratched his head and said with some embarrassment: "Maybe I was breaking through the retreat at that time, so I ......" Speaking of this, he himself was a little embarrassed. This is also due to his personality, and when he got out, his subordinates understood that he didn't like his nosy personality, and no one told him.

"But why is that?" Wei Ran exerted his spirit of not being ashamed to ask.

"Why? Why do you say? The old mayor finally couldn't suppress his anger and shouted: "When Aoshan City was the strongest, there were only dozens of high-level generals, and hundreds of high-level generals, not to mention middle and low-level generals. At that time, Aoshan City was cohesive and powerful, and it could easily subdue the various forces under it. But since that war, not only the strength of Aoshan City has been greatly damaged, but even the various towns have been depressed, since then, Aoshan City has been afraid that some people below will have different intentions and overtake Aoshan City, so they have begun to restrict the development of subordinate towns. Naturally, the people's hearts in Aoshan City began to disperse. But the prestige of the old city lord is still there, and his subordinates are very powerful, and even then no one dares to say anything. ”

But since the death of the old city lord and the accession of the new city lord, new contradictions have erupted. The new city lord couldn't suppress those elders, so he had to purge them on a large scale, causing people's hearts to be disheartened. Coupled with the fact that they did not do their own power to start a war, it caused panic in the hearts of the people. After the end of the war, the strength of Aoshan City suffered a heavy blow again, and the suppression of subordinate forces was even worse, and even forcibly demanded the downgrading of two large towns with better development and moved the population into Aoshan City. The old man finally breathed a sigh of relief.

"And what was the result?" Wei Ran was a little surprised.

"The result? Didn't the results tell you! Two large towns were naturally reluctant. Although Aoshan City is broken, but the strength is still there, the new city lord was angry, and sent people to destroy the largest town that was the happiest jumping, and the other saw that the situation was not good, so he was forced to downgrade and become a medium-sized town, but since then, his reputation has plummeted, and it is not as good as day by day. But Aoshan City didn't get much benefit, most of those displaced people were scattered, and very few people moved into Aoshan City, otherwise how do you think so many scattered villages came from. What's more, after this incident, many people were disappointed in Aoshan City. ”

"A purge, a war, has made many people question the ability of the city lord. As a result, the few remaining towns have become mediocre. When Aoshan City was still strong, they didn't dare to show anything out of the ordinary, so as not to touch the city lord's fragile nerves. Therefore, in recent years, the strength of Aoshan City has been declining, and even the strength of several subordinate towns has been declining. ”

"Besides, if it weren't for the threat of several surrounding cities, you think that the city lord would tolerate the current pattern of Aoshan City, and maybe he would have to reduce the strength of his subordinate towns again. You think I don't want to develop Aoshan Town into a large town, you think those towns are content with the status quo. You must know that the combined strength of several towns under Aoshan City is not much weaker than Aoshan City, and if it develops again, who knows what the city lord's reaction will be. He may not be able to bring glory to Aoshan City, but it is very simple to destroy Aoshan City. ”

"And the reason why I didn't let you go to suppress the bandits was because I was worried that the loss of strength would be too heavy. Now the situation is not good, only with strength in hand, will we have more say and the power of self-preservation. The old mayor sighed.

"But when there were only one or two hundred bandits, why didn't the mayor let me go?" Wei Ran still didn't understand.

"You haven't noticed a problem in all this time?" The old mayor glared at Wei Ran.

"What's the problem?" Wei Ran was still puzzled.

"Population. Where did the bandit raiders go? According to rough statistics, these bandits have plundered hundreds of times in the past month or so, and at least 1,000 people have been taken captive. Even upgrading medium-sized cottages or opening new cottages is enough to support, but according to the information we have obtained, since the collapse of the original Aoshanzhai, a new force has built a new Aoshanzhai on the site of the original Hurricane Village, and there is only such a force, and there are less than 500 people so far. So where have all these people gone? The old mayor's tone was a little serious.

"Ah, and what's going on?" Wei Ran was obviously a little surprised.

Fortunately, the old mayor didn't have much hope for him, and the reason why he said all this was to let himself filter his thoughts.

"It seems that the rumors are true." The old mayor muttered.

"What rumors?"

"There is a legend that someone built a town in Aoshan, and the failure of the city guards to suppress bandits and the destruction of Aoshanzhai were all promoted by this force, and even the actions of Aoshanzhai today are also under the command of this force. It's just that no one has confirmed it. The old mayor's tone became gloomy.

"Ah, and what's going on?"

"Yes, there is no wind and no waves!"

"Then do you want to report to the City Lord's Mansion?" Wei Ran asked.

The old mayor cast a "you are such an idiot" look, and said angrily: "Do you think the City Lord's Mansion will believe such a thing without any real evidence?" Taking a step back, even if the City Lord's Mansion believed it, would it send people from afar? Even if you send someone, do you send a large army or send an envoy? If you send a large army over, I don't know how long it will take to suppress the bandits, do you need Aoshan Town to support these people? If we send an envoy, do we have to accept the command of the envoy, then will the implementation of the next series of things fall on our head in Aoshan Town...... Have you thought about all of this? ”

"Thinking about the style of envoys who have been here before, it's true. But what if the rumors are true? Wei Ran felt that his brain was not enough.

"What are you thinking about so much! You just have to remember that as long as we have the strength in our hands, anyone will look up to us. Even if he could build a city in the mountains, it would be a big deal to surrender. ”

"Mayor Mare, why do you think that?" Wei Ran was a little surprised by the mayor's attitude.

"If you feel surprised, it's not like this, Lao Tzu didn't want to work under the Bird City Lord for a long time, if it weren't for the fact that he couldn't leave so many people, Lao Tzu would have gone farming a long time ago." The old mayor burst into a foul mouth, "Not only me, but except for the mayor, who is the city lord's cronies, which of the other mayors doesn't have such thoughts!" Arrogant and lascivious, flying and domineering, pampering and treacherous, Aoshan City is in the hands of this city lord, and I don't know how long it can last! ”

"So, it's not us who should be worried, it's those who are on top. But if the rumors are true, by the time they get the news, I'm afraid it's already too late. The old mayor even gloated a little.

"Yes, anyway, I don't have a good brain, you can do whatever you say, and you won't fool me anyway." Wei Ran said and sat down again.

"I asked you to prepare for the suppression of bandits, what are you sitting down for?"

"Didn't you say that the bandits have no conflict with us, and they can even take refuge in the forces behind them, why do you still want to suppress the bandits?" Wei Ran was puzzled.

"There was no conflict before, but just now the soldiers told me that a medium-sized village under the town of Aoshan had been attacked by bandits, and the population had been taken captive. If you don't go at this time, when will you wait?" The old mayor shouted, "Remember, don't let anyone look down on us at any time. ”

Seeing Wei Ran hurrying away, the old man in the mayor's room muttered, "Is this a temptation?" If the rumors are true, I'm afraid that Wei Ran will not face as simple as a bandit. He didn't even tell Wei Ran about this speculation.

Just when Wei Ran was hurriedly preparing to suppress the bandits, Liu Feng took Wang Ying and Qiu Ying into the village newly captured by Yunao, and said with a smile: "From now on, this place will be called Freedom Village!" This will be our first step towards Aoshan. ”

I can't get into the backstage in the afternoon, and I haven't sent it until now, forgive me!

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