And in April of the seventh year, the lieutenants of Hequ, Jianhequ, and Baima followed the good news, and the soldiers and horses had broken through the North Tianzhu.

---------------- excerpt from the introduction

In April of the seventh year of Yonghe, the Central Plains had begun to fight, and the soldiers and horses of Guanlong had also marched to Heshuo and Bingzhou, and the city and Xiangguo were still fighting to the death, and the entire north continued to be immersed in the turbulent season of war.

But Guanlong, which is only one pass away, is a rare peaceful scene. Chang'an, Longshou was just circled, the nominal Zeng Mansion has not yet started, and even the foundation has not yet begun to be laid, only a lot of stones and a lot of wild grass are piled up on the bare mountain bag.

The Chang'an University Hall on the west side of the south side of Longshouyuan is still being built in an orderly manner, but now it is the spring ploughing period, and many recruited people have gone home to participate in the most important spring ploughing of the year, and they are willing to stay here are some stonemasons and other craftsmen who rely on their crafts to eat, so the construction site of Chang'an University Hall, which seemed quite lively some time ago, has now become a bit depressed.

On the east side of Chang'an University Hall, south of Longshouyuan, the Chang'an Great Temple, which has only been built for half a year, has begun to take shape. Archbishop Fan Zhe and the bishops called on many believers to contribute to the Chang'an Grand Temple. Tens of thousands of believers responded to the call and rushed from Guanlong and Liangyi to Chang'an to volunteer for the construction of the Great Temple. They set up a tent near the temple, ate the dry food they brought, and then, under the leadership of many missionaries, priests, and priests, they divided into many small teams and began to burn bricks and carry stones. Masonry begins masonry.

In the midst of Guanlong's powerful construction boom, the original cement was fired.

Zeng Hua only knew that cement was made of lime and clay, and Zeng Hua was blind to what the specific firing process was, so according to the old practice, he handed over this arduous task to a group of craftsmen. It took a year for the craftsman to fire a very primitive cement under Zeng Hua's "guidance", and by the way, he also fired a bit of glass-like crystals, which made Zeng Hua overjoyed.

After having the "original cement", Zeng Hua ordered the construction of the entire Guanlongdi building to use stone or green bricks as much as possible, so now look at it. Whether it is a government mansion or a people's house. They are all made of cheap and easy-to-fire green bricks and original cement. And the "sacred" buildings like the temple are made of large stones from the Nanshan (Qinling Mountains). The stone is loaded on a boat and flows down the waterlogged, abundant and mangshui originating in Nanshan, and then transferred to Weishui to Chang'an, and finally transported to the construction site by manpower. The mining and transportation along the way are all volunteers of believers, and the church is just taking care of the food.

Next to the Chang'an Temple is the planned Chang'an Theological Seminary, which will be the highest institution of learning of the Holy Religion, much larger than the original Dinanzheng Seminary, Qiuchishan Seminary, and Qingchengshan Seminary.

To the south of the new Chang'an, the market area and shop area in Zenghua's plan have also started construction lively. The land in the shopping area was auctioned off by Zeng Hua. The government used the money from the auction to build public facilities such as wide roads and sewers, and then these merchants built their own shops on their own plots of land on both sides of the road, and finally formed a shop area. The stalls in the market area were also auctioned off by the government, and the government used the money from the auction to build roads and stalls according to the original sketches, and then numbered them to the merchants who auctioned them.

In this way, the government can build the shop area and the market area without paying a penny, and there is a lot of extra money that can be invested in the construction of roads, sewers, water pipelines and other public facilities in the new Chang'an. And so on and so forth. The officials of the Du branch office greatly admired Zeng Hua's way of making money.

Compared with the construction of the new Chang'an. The old Chang'an, north of Longshou Plain, was unusually quiet. Many of the people here have been given land outside the city, and now they are busy with spring ploughing. There were also many people who were attached to the city, as servants and subordinates of the powerful families and the "nouveau riche" who had forcibly moved over. They are reluctant to go to the fields. Therefore, he did not want to be Juntian by the government, but signed contracts of varying years with the powerful families who were forcibly relocated from Guanlong and Yiliang and the "upstarts" who came out with Zeng Hua in accordance with the "Employment Law" formulated by the Guanlong government, and became the slaves and subordinates in their mansions, living on the wages and rewards of the master's family.

According to the regulations of the Zeng Hua government, the people with the household registration of Long and Yiliang can only be employed, and cannot be "sold". Those displaced people who have moved over and have only been registered but have not yet been granted household registration have two options: either they rent the land of the government or the landlord's family, pay a rent 20% higher than that of ordinary people according to the tax rate set by the government, and after five years, if they have been "good citizens", they can be officially divided according to the land sharing system and officially granted household registration.

Either they "sell themselves" and join the powerful nouveau riche to become their slaves and subordinates. The treatment and salary are much lower than those of the people with household registration, and they are completely dependent on the master's family, and they can enforce family laws and the like, unlike the people with household registration who can only be sent to the official, but according to the laws of the government, they cannot be killed or disabled. After five years of dedication, if you have been a good citizen, you can be redeemed by the government and become an ordinary household registration citizen.

In the central city of the Guanlong Yiliang ruling area, there are many government offices and tens of thousands of powerful and nouveau riche households that manage this area, and there are also more than 300,000 people living here. Therefore, the transformation here is very slow, and only after the construction of the new city is completed and the people move to the new city residential area, will it begin to be renovated into a government office and official residential area.

In this old city, like many of Zenghua's big cities, there is a simple but solemn church in each city, and the "incense" here is much stronger than the increasingly deserted temples and Taoist temples, where thousands of believers from all districts come every day to pray and worship. Compared with the profound and difficult Buddhism and Taoism, the holy religion with a clear purpose, easy to understand the teachings, rigorous organization, and advanced missionary religion occupies a huge advantage. In addition, under the pretext of the monks and Taoist priests of Guanlong Temple and Taoist Temple, the Zeng Hua government ordered that the fields of various temples and Taoist temples should be confiscated into the government and the number of monks and Taoists was limited. For some monks and Taoists who were found to have bad deeds, they made a big deal about it, and then severely punished it, which indirectly hit the image of Buddhism and Taoism among the people and provided a sharp contrast for the holy religion.

Due to the increasing perfection of the doctrine and organization of the Holy Religion, the continuous supply of a large number of missionaries by various seminaries, and the strong support of Zeng Huaming in the secret, the spread of the Holy Religion can almost be described as coming in by leaps and bounds. At present, one or two missionaries have been assigned from the tun to assist the medical officers of each team. You can also write letters home for sergeants. most

Provide spiritual support for the soldiers. And the churches in various places are all over Guanlong, Yiliang and Xiqiang after the rain.

On this day, Zeng Hua held a weekly ceremony for his two sons in the Changfengli Church in Chang'an North District, presided over by Fan Zhe, and Pu, Che Yin, Duan Huan, Tian Feng and others stayed in Chang'an to watch the ceremony, filling the church to the full. The first birthday ceremony was already a very solemn event, and after it was introduced into the Holy Religious Rites, it became the first sacrament in the lives of the Holy Religious believers.

Although Zeng Hua's eldest son is more than a year old, he was still arranged to receive the first birthday gift with his eldest son. Let the real show not be sad but happy. Zhenxiu is Tuyuhun Xianbei, and he is the "key object" of the mission, so he naturally believes in the Holy Religion for a long time. Not to mention Fan Min, her husband is the Holy Sect King, her brother is the Holy Sect Archbishop, and her father is the Holy Sect Bishop, so she can't believe in the Holy Religion.

After a ceremony, Zeng Hua named Zhen Xiuzi Zeng Wen. Fan Minzi named Zeng Min. Then Fan Zhe prayed for the blessing of the two sons. In the end, it was to catch Zhou, but Zeng Wen and Zeng Min all caught the small wooden knife, and everyone couldn't help but think about it. But Zeng Hua laughed and expressed his relief.

After the ceremony, everyone got up and walked out of the church, Zeng Hua also teased his two happy sons while walking, and suddenly looked up and saw the concubine Xu holding her daughter who was less than three months old, and couldn't help but walk over. Xu smiled thoughtfully, and hugged his daughter to get close to Zeng Hua. Zeng Hua touched her daughter's pink face, and then whispered to Xu: "Don't worry, I will also hold a birthday ceremony for my daughter when she turns one year old." It doesn't matter if it's a daughter or a son, no matter who comes out, I will treat everyone equally. ”

The eyes of the Xu family and the Yu family and the eldest princess of Guiyang next to them couldn't help but light up, and they nodded again and again.

At this time, a guard hurriedly ran over, came to Zeng Hua and said, "My lord, Xiqiang three arrows are urgent!" ”

Zeng Hua hurriedly took it, opened it and looked at it hurriedly, his face changed in front of the snow-white paper, and finally said fiercely: "I'll take your lungs!" ”

Everyone who didn't know what to say was shocked, Pu, Che Yin, Duan Huan, Tian Feng and others hurriedly surrounded them, while Fan Min and others walked into the distance.

"My lord, what's wrong?" Park opened his mouth and asked, he is the chief protector of Anxi, and he has the right to take care of Xiqiang's affairs.

Zeng Hua was silent for a while before he spit out a sentence from his mouth: "Ye Li followed his mother's beating to Beitianzhu, this is a letter of good news." ”

The letters were written by missionaries who accompanied the army, and although the writing was not good, it was detailed and clear enough, and it was a dozen pages.

In March of the fifth year of Yonghe, Ye Lixun was appointed as the captain of Hequ, supervising the military supervision of the captains of Hequ and Baima, and led 5,000 Xiqiang cavalry to the west, and began to crusade against Sun Boqiang, Ma'er Kangqiang, and Bowoqiang until Shannan Qiang.

The first tribe to march from the meanders of the river is Sun Boqiang, also called Subi Qiang, located in the area of the Qiangtang Plateau in northern Tibet, they are still a matriarchal society, they are the leader of more than a dozen people, wearing green hair silk skirts, collared shirts, and green robes, their sleeves are decorated with brocade, for small ring buns, decorated with gold, earlobe bells, with two or three thousand cavalry who hurriedly got together to try to fight a decisive battle with Ye Lixun, but were defeated by Ye Lixun in a battle, beheaded more than 1,000, more than a dozen Sun Boqiang leaders were trampled to death by Ye Lixun, and more than 30,000 Sun Boqiang surrendered. The clerks and soldiers of the Yeli Xun faction sent these Sun Boqiang, who were not much better than the Qiang people of the party, into heads and 100 households according to the old practice, and set up officials for each.

However, Ye Lixun turned to the east, and with a slight threat, he subdued Ma Er Dangqiang, who occupied the upper reaches of the Jinsha River. Ma Er Dangqiang has always had a close relationship with Bai Ma Qiang, knowing that the situation in the east has changed greatly, the leaders saw Ye Lixun's "ill intentions" Chen soldiers, and immediately knew the stakes, and hurriedly sent people to ask for help. The leaders consciously handed over their subordinates to accept the reorganization, and they took their whole families to move to Yizhou to "enjoy happiness" in accordance with the Baimaqiang regulations.

It's July, and it's the season for action on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Yeli followed the horse quickly, and immediately crusaded against the Bowoqiang in the present-day Qamdo area, beheaded 1,500 people, 21 leaders, surrendered more than 20,000 Bowoqiang, and then reorganized this Qiang people.

In September, Ye Lixun took advantage of this warm season to go up the Zangqu River (now the upper reaches of the Brahmaputra River) and conquered the city of Pibo (now Zedang, Shannan, Tibet) in one fell swoop, and then defeated the combined forces of Jiqiang and Baojiqiang, and occupied Jiangwen City (now Lhasanan).

After occupying the Shannan region, Ye Lixun ordered the winter to spend the winter in this warm river valley, and successively thwarted the rebellions of the Jiqiang and Baojiqiang nobles.

Although the ancestors of these Tibetans are as strong as their descendants, because they are all primitive tribal alliances, their strength cannot be compared with that of Tibet, which entered the slave society more than 200 years later. Ye Lixun came in with 5,000 heavily armed Qiang cavalry, and it was like rushing into a pack of young wolves with a pack of adult wolves.

Ye Lixun is not merciless, he is born in the party Xiang Yeqiang, he knows what these Yeqiang are afraid of. He listened to the advice of joining the army, and unceremoniously executed Baoji Qiang Zampu and hundreds of nobles close to him, and then won over the small nobles who were not powerful before, and began to divide the heads and hundreds of households, and reorganize the Shannan Qiang people.

It was also in this winter that more than a dozen of Ye Lixun's subordinates began to have different intentions, contacted one after another, and then persuaded Ye Lixun to use this heavenly treasure to ascend the throne and create a country of his own.

Ye Lixun pretended to agree, so more and more people responded, there were more than 200 people, and began to plan the enthronement and the country's name. Ye Lixun saw that the play was almost done, and the people who should have come out also jumped out. So as soon as he turned his face, he arrested more than 200 people.

He pointed at the two hundred people and scolded: "If it weren't for General Duhu, Lao Tzu wouldn't have known where to rot in which field." And you, if it weren't for the support of General Duhu, you would still be wearing rotten skins to herd cattle and sheep, either starving to death or freezing to death, you can have today. Although I am Ye Lixun from a wild Qiang background, I also understand that I know that I can't do things that are inferior to pigs and dogs. Then he gave an order, and all the more than 200 people were tied to stones and thrown into the Zangqu River.

From then on, no one dared to say anything about self-reliance.

Ye Lixun, who settled down, lived comfortably in Yongbrakang for the winter, and was stunned for a long time, and the winter was extremely moist. In the course of the conversation, Ye Lixun heard that there was a very rich country in the south, and he could not walk on horseback for half a year. The ground was full of gold and silver, and any stone could be a gemstone.

Ye Lixun listened to that itching heart. But he remained silent, and continued to pretend to be careless about the things of the south, secretly looking for people who had been to the south, and quietly exploring the way south.

Throughout the winter, Ye Lixun began to mix tens of thousands of Jiqiang and Baojiqiang, and at the same time selected 3,000 warriors from them to start training as cavalry.