In the carrying hall, "Emperor Ming Qi Guo Xijing Painting" attracted everyone's attention.

Starting from the spring countryside, shady green trees and roadside wildflowers show the suburbs of Xijing City.

Walking through a tree-lined forest, you will be greeted by a vast expanse of farmland with no edge in sight.

In this vast plain farmland, there are people who operate tractors in the fields to clear the land, some people follow behind to apply fertilizer, and some people use tractors to pump water from the canals into the fields, in short, the farmers in the fields are working hard.

Continuing to the left, on the wide cement avenue leading to the city, the Qi soldiers who were responsible for patrolling the outside of the city were chatting and laughing with their colleagues on horses, and there were also people driving oxen and carriages on the side of the road.

Some are women who go to deliver food to the men in the fields, some are children who go to herd cattle, and some are Huangdian chariots and horses who travel between the north and south of the Qi country.

Continue to look to the left, after approaching Xijing City, the flow of people and houses outside the city gradually increases, and finally comes to a wide river.

The river water is written with the three big characters "Xijing Water", and the Xijing Water occupies one-tenth of the area of the painting, which is enough to see how wide it is.

There is a ferry market on each side of the river, and boats come and go on the river, transporting goods and people to the other side of the river.

After crossing this Xijing water and coming to the left, more and more farmers are farming, and more and more merchants appear.

Until the end, when Xijing City appeared, this grand scale of Xijing City also made the two a little unbelievable.

The "market" of Xijing City is the center and focus of the depiction of the "Portrait of Xijing of the Emperor Ming and Qi Kingdom", in which the city can be divided into two parts, east and west, by the central axis.

The West Market in the picture is a bustling downtown with streets and alleys crisscrossing each other, with buildings lining up on both sides, shops, restaurants, tea houses, pawnshops, money houses, photo studios, painting apartments, theaters, bathhouses, government offices, temples, and private houses.

The streets of the West Market are bustling with people, busy with traffic, and all kinds of sky-high signboards are eye-catching, presenting a lively scene.

The eastern city is the official office and county office, as well as the main government station of the Terracotta Division and the marking granary, as well as a market for the sale of cattle, horses, and livestock.

Of course, there are also many houses in the West Market, and there are many people talking and laughing in the streets and alleys.

On the main street of the central axis of the city, a memorial arch stands in the picture, the two sides of the memorial arch are inscribed with the words "Suzaku Street", and the right side of the middle archway is inscribed with "splendor", and the left side is written "mountains and rivers".

Entering the right of the archway is the bustling area of the market, the most eye-catching is the street full of stilts, fireworks and water frolic, dragon and lion dance, stick and machine performances.

In addition, there are also theatrical performances with a large number of spectators, as well as a colorful "Aoshan" lamp.

Xicheng has a dense water network, and the wide river is full of dragon boats, and fishing boats and rafts are shuttled back and forth under the helm of fishermen.

Tourists on both sides of the river or enjoy the scenery near the water, or leisurely tea tasting, both sides of the Xicheng River are often restaurants and teahouses, or "wood line", "boat line" and other handicraft workshops.

There are not a few people who come and go to engage in these businesses, which shows the prosperity of Xicheng.

Compared with the prosperity of the West City, the East City is not impressed.

Although there are still some shops in the East Side, the flow of people has been greatly reduced.

The largest area in Dongcheng is the Changping where grain is stored, followed by the official offices.

The flagpoles are hung on both sides in front of the official office, and the majestic stone lions are placed at the door, and the people on the main road of the entire Dongcheng are polite and do not dare to make a mistake here, which makes the Dongcheng and the noisy street market in the Xicheng form a sharp contrast.

After seeing the lives of the people, Man Gui set their sights on the palace city on the central axis.

I saw that there was a tall stone tablet under the city gate in front of the palace city, which was engraved with "civil and military officials of all sizes dismounted".

Bypassing the stele, there is a tall and majestic double palace wall.

The palaces and pavilions inside the wall are resplendent and splendid, with ups and downs, hidden or visible in the smoke and mist.

In the huge and majestic palace, there is only one magnificent palace, and in front of the solemn few soldiers holding muskets, you can imagine its cold silence and solemnity.

After reading a long picture, everyone learned about the prosperity of Xijing City.

Although this is already the most prosperous place in Qi country, the actual prosperity is in the Ming Dynasty, and it is only the level of Hanyang, Changsha, and Kunming, and even the five cities of Suzhou, Yang, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, and Yi cannot be compared, let alone the two capitals.

】

But even so, this environment has made Man Gui and them let go of enough worries.

At least in terms of pictures, Xijing City is a normal city, and it is relatively prosperous.

"Huh......" Man Gui and Sun Yingyuan put down their worries, and Lu Wenzhao next to him also introduced with great interest:

"At present, there are 790,000 immigrants who have migrated and settled in Qi State, 310,000 nationals, 1.23 million labor reformers, and 20,000 soldiers and horses."

"Among these immigrants, nearly half live in Jingzhao Province, which is comparable to a province, and the rest live in Pingling Province in the south, Anling Province in the north, and Chengshan Province and Chengshan County in the east of Chengshan."

"At the moment, there are still 120,000 immigrants waiting to immigrate to Qi within the country, and looking at this posture, I am afraid that five or six hundred thousand people can be relocated by the end of the year."

Speaking of this, Lu Wenzhao couldn't help but touch his short beard: "In my opinion, at the end of the twenty-third year of the Apocalypse, I am afraid that there will be no less than three million immigrants and nearly one million nationals in the Qi Kingdom. ”

The people are the local Indians, and they know that.

What surprised them was not the population of the Qi country, but the prosperity of the Qi country.

You must know that Zhou, Shu, Zhao, Qin, Fu, Jin and other vassal states also had large populations, but in fact the local area was not prosperous.

But now look at the Qi country, only 300,000 people in Xijing, the degree of prosperity is no less than Luoyang, Xi'an and other cities, if it is two or three years later, I am afraid that it can be with the "Suyang, Hangzhou and Guangyi" five cities side by side, it will not take many years to approach the two capitals.

If this speed is known to the vassal states, then they will probably be so angry that they will grit their teeth, after all, for them, the steam engine is only for seeing, not for use.

Not to mention the steam engine, even cement, they were limited by the Ming Dynasty, after all, cement is now a strategic material of the Ming Dynasty.

"Your mansion has been repaired by Kim Hyun, ...... here"

Zhu Youzhen raised his finger to a place, and then appeared in front of everyone is the "Xuanhua", "Dingxing" two Hou Mansions, from the map to see that the area is very large, next to the Liaodong Hou Mansion and several Bo Mansion under construction.

From here, they can see that there are a lot of people that Zhu Youzhen wants to take away, not just some of them as they feared.

"At present, although the Qi State is on the right track, the central Francois has not been expelled."

Zhu Youzhen opened his mouth to speak, and Lu Wenzhao next to him also hurriedly pulled out the whole map of the entire South and North Asia Melica.

On the map, Spain, which occupies the central region of North and South America, is particularly eye-catching, and Zhu Youzhen also said:

"The Franji people make a profit of six or seven million taels of silver here every year, so they are naturally reluctant to give up here."

"When I was in the Ming Dynasty, I couldn't recover this lost land, but when I became a vassal, it was only a matter of time before I recovered this lost land."

Zhu Youzhen drew a line with his hand in the northern part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain: "I told Kim Hyun half a year ago to hurry up and open up the central region east of Chengshan and west of Hejian. ”

"There aren't many natives living here, but only four or five million."

"In the case of troops sent by the provinces of North Asia and Melica, 40,000 soldiers and horses can subdue most of the natives."

There is a reason why Zhu Youzhen chose to land in North America, and the native population of the Americas in this era was between 30 million and 100 million, and it is very likely that it was around 50 million.

However, most of them live in Central and South America, while in North America, there are not many natives living in North America, only four or five million people.

These four or five million people were further reduced by the smallpox glaciers spread by Europeans and the constant westward movement.

Zhu Youzhen remembers well, the history books said that the number of North American Indians was likely to drop to less than 2 million before 1700, and even only 720,000 by 1820.

This population is not difficult for the Qi State, which has the population of the Ming Dynasty, to annex and assimilate them.

In particular, the skin color and race of the two are similar, and there will be no discomfort after assimilation, and there will be no Levian phenomenon.

With the strength of the Qi State, it only takes one generation to assimilate North America, while South America and Central America have to be judged by the specific number of local populations.

Due to the long isolation of the American continent from Eurasia, the Indians of the Americas were completely resistant to viruses such as smallpox, measles, mumps, whooping cough, influenza, and malaria brought by Europeans.

These infectious diseases, which claimed countless lives in Eurasia, raged in North and South America from the late fifteenth century to the first half of the seventeenth century, claiming the lives of about 50 to 90 percent of the indigenous people.

Zhu estimates that the number of indigenous people in Central and South America is close to 50 million, and if they are 90% of the population eliminated by the virus, it will take Zhu to assimilate them for decades.

But if they still have 10 million or 20 million, it will take several generations to continue to pay.

After all, although the infectious diseases brought by the Europeans caused most of the aborigines to die, the surviving Indians successfully possessed immunity against infectious diseases and basically did not die on a large scale due to the sudden appearance of the virus.

Qi can only slowly assimilate each other, but fortunately, with the blessing of policies and weapons, and the Ming Dynasty, which has more than 160 million Han people behind it, if Zhu Youxiao's father and son can reign a little longer, then Qi may be able to complete the population assimilation of North and South America decades ahead of schedule.

Thinking of this, Zhu Youzhen also looked at the three prefectures of Qi in South America, Ninghai, Wendeng, and Jinghai.

Only 9,000 soldiers and horses were stationed in the area, and the firearms used were still flintlock muskets, so they could only hold on to more than enough and not enough to attack.

The state of Qi had to eat every inch of land little by little before it could go south and establish prefectures and counties on the South American coast.

"Now it's up to Kim Hyun's speed......" Zhu Youzhen muttered, and at the same time as he muttered, a sound of a gun also sounded in the central plains of North Asia Melica.

"Bang Bang Bang-"

In February, when the crisp sound of footsteps and horses' hooves sounded, an invitation to assimilation and absorption had already been initiated to the natives of the central region.

For the receiving tribes, the Qi State does not need them to do anything, but will send people to learn their language, and set up a local imperial store to bring them food.

Of course, food is not given for free, and the Qi State needs them to help build roads or rectify rivers.

Due to the large number of tribes in the Central Plains, the soldiers and horses sent by Kim Hyun could only negotiate with various tribes in the form of interpreters with interpreters and translators with translators.

For the peace-loving tribes, the Qi army negotiated normally, stating the conditions that Jin Xuan gave to the locals, and promising that in the future they would be protected by the Qi state, and their children would be able to learn the culture of the Qi country.

For the brutal tribes, once the Qi army found out that the other party was ready to make a move, they would immediately raze the tribes to the ground with a thunderbolt, assign their hunting grounds to the obedient tribes, and throw them to Jinshan Mansion (Alaska) to engage in labor reform work for ten years.

Compared with the Europeans, the American Turks still regarded the Qi State as a tribe that rose to the west.

They believed that the Qi State and they were a tribal and tribal contest, unlike the Europeans.

Moreover, the Qi State did not want their hunting grounds, but would hire them to do some "very easy" work, and then give them food and teach them how to eat these things.

Compared to the Europeans who were rampant in the Americas, Qi Guo's behavior was not offensive.

Wherever the soldiers and horses of the Qi State passed, it was often just a simple arrangement of villages and the establishment of townships and towns.

The towns and villages were all the places where the Han people would settle in the future, and the places they chose were also close to the river, but they were relatively muddy.

This kind of place seemed rotten to the Indians, but for the people of Qi who liked to grow rice, as long as they built water conservancy projects, built canals, and used tractors, the local area would soon prosper.

The land in this area is black soil with extremely high nutrient content, located on the central great plain of later generations.

The Central Great Plains is flat, fertile, and sparsely populated, making it ideal for agriculture, but it is difficult for the Indians to cultivate the land here because of the North American winds.

It's just that for the people of Qi who have entered the first industrial revolution, this place is simply the chosen place.

"This is a good place, you can build a city here in the future,"

On horseback on the plain, when a twenty-year-old boy looked around and sighed, a guard not far away also shouted to him:

"Zhang Huangyan! Take your people to the north to have a look, and ask the brothers of the Third Banner if they have finished dealing with the fleeing natives? ”

"Humble command!"

Zhang Huangyan, who was in his early twenties, responded loudly with a smile, then turned around and shook the reins of his horse, and rushed towards the forest to the north with nearly a hundred cavalry around him.

That is, in a quarter of an hour, when Zhang Huangyan and they arrived, only the bound natives appeared in the forest, and the Qi soldiers who were vigilantly resting beside them.

"Huang Chuangzi! Li Shoubei asked how busy you are with things here. ”

Rushing into the forest with the cavalry, seeing the end of the battle, Zhang Huangyan shouted to a bearded man sitting on a baggage cart with high spirits.

The other party also looked at it when he heard this, and then pointed to the severed head next to him: "The people who attacked us have been disposed of, and the rest of this group of people will ask you to send a team of brothers to Chengshan Mansion." ”

"Good!" Hearing that the battle was over, Zhang Huangyan instructed to the left and right, and sent a team of more than ten cavalry to escort the more than 300 natives to Chengshan Mansion.

Not surprisingly, this group of people will soon become labor reformers, and after ten years of labor reform, they will learn the official language of the Ming Dynasty, and then become citizens of Qi State.

Of course, the labor camp is very difficult, and it is difficult to say how much of these 300 people will survive.

However, since they took the initiative to attack the Qi army, Zhang Huangyan had nothing to say.

After arranging the matter, he first led people back to the plain and told Li Shoubei about the matter.

Li Shoubei couldn't help but nod when he heard this: "Okay, it seems that there is only one tribe around here, and there will be no results if we continue to search, so let's continue to go east." ”

"Yes!" Zhang Huangyan returned the salute, and then began to march east according to Li Shoubei's words.

Their troops and horses set out from Chengshan Province and traveled all the way to the east, preparing to completely solve the problem of the natives in the Central Plains after meeting with the westward advance team of Hejian Province soon after.

Today is the fifteenth day of their departure, and they have also traveled a thousand miles southeast along the Chengshui (Missouri River).

Along the way, they could only communicate with the various tribes through their team of translators of a dozen people, but fortunately, they also appeased six tribes, large and small, and wiped out three tribes that resisted and tried to rob them of their wealth.

Their team of more than 500 people, if they want to eat them, unless they bring tens of thousands of natives, it will be difficult for them to be annihilated with infantry guns and artillery.

The plains of North Asia were flat, but also dry, but fortunately, the Qi army was all along the river in search of the native tribes, so there was basically not much trouble with supplies along the way.

With the help of rifles, they were able to find a herd of bison and kill a few to feed the entire army.

The military rations they carried there were enough for them to eat on the east coast, so no one was worried.

"Zhang Huangyan, I heard that the gentry of the national dynasty have moved away, what about your family?"

On the night of camping on the bank of the Chengshui River, eating roast beef sprinkled with seasonings and white porridge made from a small amount of military rations, Huang Quan, who was known as Huang Chuangzi during the day, asked Zhang Huangyan, who was sitting on the side.

Hearing this, Zhang Huangyan also shook his head and said, "I don't know either." ”

"I got the news before, so I asked them to move to Qi State, but they said that Qi Country was dangerous, and they would rather go to Nanzhou."

"After that, there was no response to the letter I sent."

Speaking of his family, Zhang Huangyan's mood was a little low.

Three years ago, he graduated from official school, and he chose to come to Qi at that time, because he felt that King Qi was a virtuous king in the world, and Qi had great potential.

After coming here, Qi Guo was just as he expected, and in a little bit of development, it gradually became a point where Zhang Huangyan did not dare to describe.

Especially after hundreds of thousands of immigrants poured into Qi last year, Qi ushered in an outbreak in an instant.

The previously empty city became prosperous in an instant, and the national politics of Qi also made many people rejoice.

Qi is a country where a large number of industries are state-run, which Zhang Huangyan had heard of before he came.

However, after he arrived, he was still a little surprised by the strength of Qi State's monopoly on state management.

In addition to handicrafts, the only things left of the people were farming, running houses, porters, and street vendors.

Zhang Huangyan didn't dare to say whether this kind of thing was good or bad, but in his opinion, the people of Qi were living a very nourishing life.

Moreover, the state-run of Qi State has given the imperial court more income, and these revenues will also be used by Qi officials for the citizens of Qi State, which is taken from the people and used by the people in the real sense.

The officials of the Qi State hired the citizens to work, bought the grain in the hands of the Qi people, and then built water conservancy projects and roads for the local government.

In the construction of these projects for the benefit of the people, the officials of Qi State never raised taxes, so the people of Qi State lived a very nourishing life.

For Zhang Huangyan, who was born in Jiangnan, no one knows the importance of water conservancy projects better than him.

If the water conservancy projects in the three provinces south of the Yangtze River are properly rectified during the Wanli period, the number of floods and floods in the three provinces south of the Yangtze River will be reduced to single digits per year.

Before King Qi ordered the construction of water conservancy in the three provinces south of the Yangtze River in the tenth year of the Apocalypse, Zhang Huangyan's childhood impression was full of floods and floods in the rainy season, floods, and floods of rivers overflowing the embankments and flooding the cities.

These scenes completely disappeared fifteen years after the Apocalypse, which was one of the reasons why he chose to come to the Qi Kingdom after graduating from Ying Tianfu School.

He believed in the State of Qi very much, or rather, he believed in the King of Qi.

It's just that although he believes it, his family doesn't believe it.

Zhang Huangyan's family is a bureaucratic family, his father has been an official for several generations, and his father Zhang Guizhang is an official and a member of the criminal department.

Zhang Guizhang is a typical conservative school, although he does not object to Zhang Huangyan studying official education, but he opposes Zhang Huangyan to serve the Qi State.

Last year, when Zhang Huangyan learned of the "abolition" movement in Jiangnan, he immediately wrote a letter to his family.

Through the steam engine ship, the reply from home was delivered to him in Layue.

Zhang Guizhang had some connections in officialdom, so he was not affected by the "abolitionist movement".

However, the "abolitionist movement" raised Zhang Guizhang's dislike of Zhu Youzhen to a new height.

The slaves of the Zhang family were ransomed, the fields were exchanged for paper money by the king of Qi, and only he and a few brothers, sons and nephews were left in the entire Zhang family.

Under such an encounter, Zhang Guizhang wrote very clearly in his reply to Zhang Huangyan, that is, it was absolutely impossible for him to move to Qi State, and he wanted to move his family to Nanzhou.

He still has a lot of old knowledge in Nanzhou, and it is not difficult to make a comeback, but when he went to the Qi country, he was worried that the crazy King of Qi would take action against the gentry who moved to the Qi country in the future.

This is not only the opinion of Zhang Guizhang alone, but also the opinion of most of the gentry.

Therefore, the state of Qi can be said to be the only vassal state that did not have the migration of the gentry.

Even the kingdoms of Ji, Tang, and Huai, which were far away in Western Liviia, had to have a few gentry migrate, but there was not a single one in the Qi state.

At the end of the letter, Zhang Guizhang also advised Zhang Huangyan not to stay in the Qi State, because with his background as a bureaucratic gentry, he probably would not be reused.

However, in this regard, Zhang Huangyan also replied after reading the family letter.

He felt that the Qi State was very fair, the people lived a very prosperous life, and gradually prospered, and the King of Qi was very enlightened, and the officials of the Qi State were also straightforward characters, and he would rather stay here than the twists and turns of the Ming officialdom.

In the letter, Zhang Huangyan also wrote many interesting stories and developments of Qi State, but according to the time, his letter is still floating on the sea at the moment, and has not yet been delivered to Zhang Guizhang, who has migrated to Nanzhou.

Zhang Huangyan told Huang Quan what happened to his family and the content of the letters he exchanged with his father, because he and Huang Quan were fellow villagers and had joined the army together.

However, Huang Quan was just the son of an ordinary peasant, and he was not as lucky as him, and he came out of the school after reading the house, but came to the country of Qi after finishing the first school.

"Uncle has uncle's considerations, but after hearing you talk about the "abolition of slavery", I am a little glad that my family has been white for three generations. ”

Huang Quan in front of the bonfire couldn't help but sigh a little, Zhang Huang also sighed and shook his head when he heard this:

"That's it, don't think about it anymore, let's think about whether we can find a few more native tribes tomorrow."

He didn't want to talk anymore, but Huang Quan came over cheaply:

"Let's talk about it again, you kid has a lot of knowledge, you tell me, when do you think His Royal Highness the King of Qi will return to the Qi Kingdom."

"I don't know ......"

"Don't be a little woman, talk about it and don't get in the way, the brothers are curious......"

"If I want to know, I'll still be just a flag officer?"

"That's ...... too"

The conversation between the two slowly ended as the bonfire burned out, and tomorrow, they will embark on a journey to contribute to the construction of the Qi Kingdom.