The wax moon has entered the second half of the month, and even the southwest region has entered the real midwinter season.

The north wind called, the temperature dropped sharply, and in the past few days, there was more heavy snow coming with the wind, connecting the heavens and the earth, dyeing this land of abundance white.

In Huayang City, the original Mu Mansion has now become Sun Ning's temporary residence.

There are four huge copper beast stoves in the hall, the charcoal fire is extremely strong, but there is no trace of fireworks, only the temperature in the hall is baked like the middle of spring, so that Shen Zhou, who has just weathered the wind and snow, only feels so uncomfortable, after taking off his heavy coat, he salutes Sun Ning in a regular manner.

"No need to be polite, just sit down and talk." Sun Ning smiled and waved his hand, signaling Wei Shen on the side to deliver the prepared ginger tea to the hand of the important minister beside him.

Shen Zhou is indeed a very important political official by Sun Ning's side now, and his status is still above Dingxi Hou Xiao Changyong and others, because his position as the head of the household department is to provide logistics and food for the army at the front.

This is only the key duty when there is a war on the front line, and after coming to Huayang now, he has become the leader of the newly collected affairs of Huayang, Shunzhou and other Sichuan and Shu prefectures, as well as the amount of money and grain taxes, and he has really become a figure like the logistics chief of the Dayue Dynasty today.

In the seven or eight days after he came to Huayang alone, he handled two or three hundred affairs, each of which had an extremely direct relationship with the local people's livelihood and the stability of the army.

However, under Shen Zhou's efforts to deal with it in a balanced manner, these big and small matters were perfectly and properly resolved, not only the soldiers of the Vietnamese army and the southern Sichuan coalition army were full of praise, but also the local barbarians and Han people. Although it has not reached the point of praise from everyone, at least it has kept these newly taken state capitals and counties by the imperial court calm and stable.

Therefore, in Sun Ning's eyes, this courtier who he rescued and recruited from the mountain bandits' den was really a peerless warrior in the world.

In this way, in terms of attitude, Sun Ning was naturally very polite to him, and at this time, he asked with a smile: "There is nothing wrong with all the affairs in the city, right?" If there is any difficulty, just mention it, and I will help you solve it. ”

Shen Zhou hurriedly put the cup on the table in front of him, and then he bowed and said: "Your Majesty Xie cares, many trivial and miscellaneous matters in the city can be solved one by one, and Your Majesty should not bother." ”

"That's good. Then what you have to do next is to continue to reassure people, and gather all the money and taxes that should be collected, and prepare for the next expedition. Sun Ning nodded with satisfaction and mentioned it again.

No matter in any era, the most fundamental thing to fight with soldiers is money and food, before Sun Ning relied on the savings of Hezhou and Banzhou and other places to continue to march and seize the city, but then, as these barbarians all bowed down to the court, the logistics had to be completely arranged by the imperial court.

"The minister understands that the minister must do his best, and after the spring of next year, he will raise enough money and food for the army of 100,000 to come back." Shen Zhou hurriedly reassured.

It's just that there is still a little sadness between his eyebrows, this matter is really very difficult to handle, not only to appease those barbarians who surrendered, but also to do not disturb the livelihood of the people, but also to come up with enough food and money, this is a huge problem for any economic minister.

But he still did not hesitate to respond, and he will do his best to get things done.

Sun Ning nodded, and didn't ask him what he would do to do this, giving him a lot of trust.

Such a tacit reaction of mutual trust between monarchs and ministers fell into the eyes of several other people in the hall, and they were not without envy.

At this time, Shen Zhou spoke again: "Your Majesty, the minister asked to see you today because I heard that you are planning to go to Kuizhou?" ”

"You are well-informed enough, yes, Qingyun brought back the conditions for the surrender of the Long family from Kuizhou, including letting me go to personally testify to one, for the overall situation of Sichuan and Shu, and in order not to increase the killing, the lives are ruined, I do plan to take this matter and go to Kuizhou."

After hearing the emperor's exact reply, Shen Zhou's expression tightened even more, and after turning his head slightly to look at Zhuge Qingyun, who was silent, he said, "Your Majesty, the minister thinks it is impossible!" ”

"Huh? What do you mean by that? Sun Ning smiled and asked, unable to see joy or anger.

"Because it's too dangerous, the fact that the Kuizhou Long clan made such a request is itself worthy of questioning its intentions, not to mention that Your Majesty is a daughter, how can he risk his life?"

Shen Zhou said, and looked at Zhuge Qingyun again: "Brother Zhuge , if I don't want to stop you from making meritorious contributions, it's really ......."

Zhuge Qingyun didn't wait for him to finish speaking, and nodded vigorously: "What Lord Shen said is that in fact, the lower officials also considered this on the way back, so after explaining the conditions of the Long family to His Majesty, he also thought that he should not agree." ”

Shen Zhou breathed a sigh of relief, it seemed that Zhuge Qingyun was also a cautious person, and when he sensed the danger, he looked at Sun Ning and said: "Your Majesty, no matter how difficult Kuizhou is, no matter how many soldiers and horses there are, it is only a corner of Sichuan and Shu today, and there is really no need to put yourself in danger for this place."

"If Your Majesty is merciful and really doesn't want to use swords again, we also have a way to subdue the Long family. Or you can send soldiers and horses to block the path around it, and the shortage of food in Kuizhou will not take half a year, which is enough to make the Long clan bow their heads and be vassals.

In addition, counter-plots can also be used to divide their internal forces. The minister thinks that no matter how monolithic the race is, there must be internal dislikes, as long as it is used well, it can be subdued at the lowest cost, and the soldiers will be bloodless, so why do you have to accept their rude demands? ”

Zhuge Qingyun also nodded thoughtfully beside him: "Yes, Your Majesty, going to Kuizhou is really the next policy in the next policy, once you really go, your safety will be in the hands of others, and the ministers really can't believe that these barbarians who are not loyal enough to the court will do their best to protect Your Majesty and not have other ideas." ”

Seeing that the two important ministers said this, several other generals in the hall, such as Yan Hu and Xiao Keding, also spoke out in agreement, thinking that it was inappropriate for Sun Ning to only bring a small number of people to Kuizhou this time, and he really shouldn't take this risk.

In the face of the persuasion of these many courtiers, Sun Ning did not show an unhappy look on his face, but there was some relief in his eyes.

After a moment, Fang Cai smiled and nodded: "Your concerns are not unreasonable, in fact, I don't feel how sincere they are. If you think about those conditions carefully, it's too simple, don't say that they took the initiative to vote, that is, they surrendered after defeat, just like the Mu clan, as long as I and the imperial court still have places where they can be used, these will also be accepted.

"Therefore, the last one that came out of nowhere and asked me to go to Kuizhou in person is particularly problematic. There must be deception in it! ”