The time soon came to the eighth year of Zhao Wangkuo.

At the beginning of the year, Zhao Kuo held a court meeting in Handan, and in addition to the five princes and twelve kings, the two governors and all the county guards rushed to attend the court meeting.

The court meeting determined that the development direction of Zhao in the next five years will still be based on domestic economic construction, supplemented by foreign expansion. Roads in Yandi, Guanzhong, Hexi Corridor and other places should be built as soon as possible, and Hebei, the hinterland of Zhao State, should be integrated into a whole.

The old coins in the hands of the people should be recovered as soon as possible and replaced with new unified coins, weights and measures should also be unified as soon as possible, and books should be on the same track as the literary car. In short, two systems were not allowed to appear in the territory of Zhao.

The colleges and library pavilions in each county should be built and popularized as soon as possible, and the townships can be temporarily given up first, and the Zhao State cannot take care of it in a short time, but each county must have a college and library pavilion, and the teaching must use the Zhao script and Zhao dialect, and the relevant teaching materials must also use the textbooks compiled by the imperial court, and private teaching materials are not allowed.

There will be some resistance to this, but not as much as it seems. Except for the Chu State, the characters of the other six countries are basically unified, and only a few variant characters are different.

It will not be said that because of the popularization of the Zhao script, all the previous efforts were in vain.

Of course, there will definitely be an impact.

However, because the Chu State has always been in a state of separation from the Central Plains cultural circle, and is deeply influenced by the Southern Barbarians, the writing is more like a bird and insect body, and the writing is quite different from the Central Plains countries.

As for the teachers, they were transferred directly from various colleges in Zhao Kingdom.

Anyway, junior colleges only teach literacy and arithmetic, and those who have graduated with better grades are enough to take on this responsibility.

Then, the imperial court ordered that the enrollment quota of Handan College be doubled this year, and each county could recommend some young and talented scholars to study in the college.

Not only that, but the imperial court also issued a notice that the world-renowned Xunzi, Wei Wuji, Le Yi, Zhao Sheng and others would give lessons to the scholars in the academy, and even King Zhao might appear.

For a while, all the soldiers in the world were attracted to Handan Academy, and if they were lucky enough to seize this opportunity, they would have struggled for twenty years less in the second half of their lives.

After several years of development, Handan University has become the cultural and academic center of the Central Plains, and there will be fierce ideological collisions and technical confrontations in the college every day.

Xunzi's Fu style is even more popular in the college, and is respected by many scholars.

For a time, the Central Plains brought about a culture of writing fu, from describing the four o'clock to criticizing the government, and finally evolved into a praise of Zhao and a satire of other countries.

The roots of the teeth of other countries are itchy, but there is nothing they can do.

Zhao State's light tax for several years in a row has made the people's lives much better, and after having coal and cotton clothes, Zhao has not had a large-scale disaster this winter.

As soon as the first lunar month ended, all parts of Zhao Kingdom began to work in full swing.

Zheng Guo led hundreds of thousands of people to govern the Liao River, the Hetao was also finishing up the water conservancy project, Yuan Hua led the fleet to start sailing again, and the Hexi Corridor was also recruiting people to build roads everywhere.

"Recruit people to build roads, fifteen yuan a day, take care of food at noon, finish the day and pay the money on the same day." In Zhangye County, almost all the cities have posted notices, and there are even small officials standing on the side of the road, holding a sign and shouting.

As long as you sign up, someone will take you to the construction site immediately, and it doesn't matter if you can't read, as long as you can work.

"Big brother, why don't we take the tribe over to build a road for the Zhao people." In the distance, a burly man turned back to the eldest brother and said.

They are not Zhao people, but Qiang people.

Qiang people to graze for a living, in the early spring of each year, cattle, sheep and horses are hungry for a winter, and it is the season of mating, a large amount of grassland is needed, but at this time the grassland has just sent out buds, which is simply not enough for so many livestock to eat.

This is the time of year when nomads are at their weakest. Not only do they like to fight for grassland internally, but the Central Plains Dynasty also likes to attack them at this time.

And the scimitar Qiang is the one that loses in the competition, as a loss

The losers, they can only dedicate the fertile pastures to the enemy, and lead the clansmen to find new pastures.

However, the grassland is very large, but there are not many suitable grasslands, and most of the grasslands also have owners, they have been looking for a month, but they have not found a grassland that can be used by the tribe to recuperate, and if this continues, they can only find a large tribe to go to.

However, seeing Zhao Guo's recruitment publicity, Yu Hun, the second leader of the scimitar Qiang, had other ideas.

Rather than being annexed by other tribes, it is better to go to work for Zhao State, there are more than 1,000 adult men in Scimitar Qiang, and they can earn a lot of money every day, which is enough to feed the entire tribe, no matter what, it is better than defecting to other tribes.

Now they are still tribal leaders, and if they defect to other tribes, they will be no different from those tribesmen.

"Will the Zhao people agree?" Bell Ling had some doubts, the relationship between the Qiang people and the Zhao people was not good.

"Just ask." Yuhun said and walked towards the city, and after a while, he came to the registration place, "We are Qiang people, and we also want to come here to repair the road, can we sign up?"

"Qiang?" The little official was a little surprised, this was the first time that a Qiang person wanted to sign up.

"Not bad." Yuhun nodded.

"Wait a minute, I'll have to report this to the county guard first." The little official clenched his fists and said.

"I'll wait for you here." Yuhun said.

The servant saluted, turned and walked towards the city, and soon came to the county guard's mansion.

"Qiang people are Qiang people, no matter who it is, as long as they come to work for me Zhao Guo, they will receive everything, pay money on time, and don't deduct a penny." When Meng Fu heard the report, he waved his hand and ordered.

This is a good thing for the Zhao State, not only to increase the manpower, but also to divide the Qiang people, weaken the strength of the Qiang people, and understand the situation of the Qiang people.

"The subordinates felt that this matter could be publicized more to attract more Qiang people to come down the mountain. The subordinates don't believe in such a big Qiang tribe, only this one can't survive. In addition, if the Qiang and Zhao people mix together to build roads, it will inevitably cause unnecessary friction, so his subordinates suggested that the Qiang and Zhao people build roads separately and arrange different personnel management to reduce conflicts between them."

"In addition, we can also send people to talk to these tribal leaders, and if they are willing to submit to our Zhao State, and agree that our Zhao State will arrange officials to manage and organize the households, and our Zhao State can allocate a part of the pasture for them to graze. The king said that for the Qiang people, a group should be co-opted, a group should be suppressed, and a group should be destroyed. The tribes that are willing to show favor to my Zhao Kingdom now are the ones who can be wooed." Wu Yu said.

There are many fertile pastures in the Hexi Corridor, and it is not unacceptable to hand them over to the Qiang people for grazing, but the premise is that the Qiang people become their own.

"What Jun Cheng said makes sense, the matter of talking to the Qiang people will be handed over to Jun Cheng, just tell me when you have the result." Meng Fu nodded, "Recently, the western part of the Hexi Corridor has been a little unstable, and the caravan has reported that the Qiang cavalry and the Hu cavalry often harass the caravan back and forth, and even sent troops to rob, and I planned to lead the army to teach those Qiang Hu a lesson."

"Do you want to report to the court and let the court send troops? It's a little safer." Wu Yu said.

"You also know the king's character, if you don't fight an unprepared battle, you must understand all the enemy's situation, and then send troops to kill with one blow, we are just taking the lead in the imperial army." Meng Fu said.

He never expected his thousands of soldiers trained for a winter to solve the problem, but as long as it was on the plains, he was not afraid of those Qiang horsemen.

It turned out that Meng Fu's idea was correct, and these Qiang and Hu people were indeed no match for the Zhao army.

In March, Meng Fu killed all the way from the eastern part of the Hexi Corridor to the western part of the Hexi Corridor, and the Hu people fled one after another along the way, and Meng Fu did not stop until a country called Loulan.

The lord of Loulan hurriedly sent his ministers out of the city to sue for peace, praying that Zhao Jun would let Loulan go.

Meng Fu originally had no intention of attacking Loulan, mainly because he couldn't defeat it, although Loulan was a small country, but it also had a city to rely on, not that he could defeat it with only two or three thousand people.

So Meng Fu planned to lead the army back, and at this moment, an unexpected acquaintance came out of Loulan City and found him.

It is the younger brother of King Zhao, Zhao Mu, the secretary of Zhao State.

"I've seen General Mengfu, dare to ask...... Why is the General here?" Zhao Mu said strangely, if it weren't for the big banner of the word 'Zhao' fluttering in the wind in the army, he would have doubted whether Meng Fu had surrendered to Qin.

He remembered that the Hexi Corridor was obviously the territory of the Qiang and Qin States.

"Merchants? Son...... Why is it in Loulan Kingdom?" Meng Wei looked at Zhao Mu in surprise.

"I led the caravan back, passed through Loulan, and rested here for a day, but I didn't expect to meet the general." Zhao Mu said with a smile.

"Now the Hexi Corridor is the territory of my Zhao Kingdom, and this matter has to start from the year before last......" Meng Fu stretched out his hand and said, leading Zhao Mu to the military camp and ordering tea to be served left and right.

"I didn't expect so many things to happen in the Central Plains during the time I was away." Zhao Mu was a little emotional.

"Childe doesn't know, since you left, the king and the queen mother have been talking about you, the king often said that you shouldn't let you go to the Western Regions, and last autumn, the king also sent a caravan to the Western Regions to find Childe. I wonder if Childe has encountered it?" Meng Fu said.

Zhao Mu shook his head, the Western Regions is bigger, and the possibility of the two caravans meeting is very small.

"By the way, please also ask the general to send someone to tell the imperial court, and say that I have returned with a caravan. Also returning was the envoy of the Mauryan Empire, Ashoka's younger brother Ashande. Let the court make some preparations." Zhao Mu said.

More than two years ago, he led a caravan all the way to the west, visited many countries on behalf of Zhao State, and established contacts with most of them, but the strength of these countries was very weak, and even the weakest Yan State was inferior to the Central Plains, let alone compared with Zhao State.

Until he came to the Mauryan Empire, which was an incomparably strong and prosperous country, with a vast territory, a large population, and a strong military, the monarch Ashoka was also an incomparably wise monarch.

There, Zhao Mu was warmly received by Ashoka, and when Ashoka learned that Zhao Mu came to the Peacock Dynasty from the east thousands of miles away, he was very excited and pulled Zhao Mu to talk a lot.

Zhao Mu told Ashoka that he was from Zhao and was an incomparably powerful country, and there were six more powerful countries like Zhao in the east.

Zhao Mu learned from Ashoka that the Mauryan Dynasty had just completed its unification, and the country was not stable, and it was only by relying on strong military strength that it suppressed the Quartet.

In the Peacock Dynasty, Zhao Mu saw a military soul legion that was no less than Zhao Feiqi's.

According to Zhao Mu's speculation, the strength of the Peacock Dynasty is definitely greater than that of the current Zhao State, but it should not be as good as the countries of the Central Plains combined.

Zhao Mu stayed in the Mauryan Dynasty for half a year, visited many places, and also had some understanding of some of the main cities and customs of the Mauryan Dynasty.

The Mauryan Dynasty, like the Zhao State, was the largest monarch. But the difference is that the religious forces of the Mauryan Empire are also extremely powerful, led by Brahmanism and Buddhism, as well as Jainism, etc., which penetrate into all aspects of the country and can even influence national decision-making.

And the wise and martial Emperor Ashoka not only did not want to weaken the power of religion, but allowed it to develop, and even helped Buddhism build stupas and hold ***.

This is absolutely impossible in the Central Plains.

No country in the Central Plains would allow religious forces to override the royal power, let alone a generation of heroes.

In this process, Zhao Mu got acquainted with Ashoka's daughter and had feelings for each other, after Ashoka learned about it, not only did he not object, but took the initiative to match this matter and married his daughter to Zhao Mu.

In terms of identity, status, and ability, Zhao Mu is worthy of the princess of the Peacock Dynasty.

Half a year later, Zhao Mu asked Ashoka to resign, saying that he wanted to return to Zhao, and Ashoka proposed to send his younger brother Ashande as an envoy to represent the Mauryan Dynasty to envoy Zhao, and at the same time send troops to escort Zhao Mu and others, until they arrived at the border of the Mauryan Dynasty.

There are two scepters and documents of the Zhao State and the Peacock Dynasty, no country dares to stop them along the way, Zhao Mu entered the Western Regions very smoothly, all the way to the east, into the Loulan Kingdom, and then met Meng Fu......

"The Emissary of the Mauryan Empire......" Meng Fu was still a little confused.

"Brother Wang will know, as long as the general is good

Just report it. By the way, when I see the envoy of the Mauryan Dynasty later, the general must not show timidity, and do not mention the recent events in the Central Plains." Zhao Mu said.

"Don't worry, Childe, just a barbarian, how can I show my cowardice?" Meng Fu showed a look of disdain in his eyes, what kind of Peacock Dynasty is just a barbarian, and it is also worthy of being compared with Zhao State?

That is, the distance between the two countries is too far, otherwise he will hang the Mauryan Dynasty and fight it.

Zhao Mu returned to Loulan Kingdom, and after bidding farewell to the lord of Loulan Kingdom, he came to the military camp with a caravan.

"This is the county guard of Zhangye County of Zhao Kingdom. This is the Mauryan Empire's envoy Ashande, and this is the inner man Aliva." Zhao Mu introduced.

"......" Meng Fu was stunned for a moment, you didn't say it just now, you still have an insider.

Besides, you have found a daughter-in-law in a foreign country, do the king and the queen mother know?