"King!"

Shi Hu did not receive Shi Min in the Evergreen Palace, which specializes in dealing with government affairs, or in the side hall. Instead, he chose to be met in the harem, apparently just getting up.

It hurt Shi Min to wait in the warm pavilion for almost half an hour!

At this time, Shi Hu looked sleepy-eyed, yawning from time to time, and seemed to have just gotten up from the bed. Shi Hu was only wearing a fox fur, not much clothing, and sniffing the smell in the air, Shi Min knew that this guy must have just gotten up from a woman!

Shi Hu summoned Shi Min in a warm pavilion.

Shi Hu said with a sigh: "Thorn slave, you don't sleep in the bed on a cold day. What did you do when you came to see me? ”

Seeing that Shi Hu is in a good mood today, his attitude towards Shi Min is not bad.

If it were normal times, if it was someone else's words, Shi Hu would either excuse himself and say that he was not there, or he would reprimand the guy who disturbed his sleep, and then whip him!

But Shi Hu knew Shi Min's character, and he had nothing to do but go to the Three Treasures Palace. If he is an audience, he will have something important.

"My lord, there is something I want to discuss with you."

"What?"

"The minister wants to form a strong army similar to the trapped camp to charge into battle. However, it would cost a lot of financial and material resources to form this strong army, and the supply in the army was really insufficient, so the minister wanted to ask the king to approve a sum of military expenses. ”

Hearing this, Shi Hu's face became gloomy, as soon as he got up from the bed, he was reached out by someone else to ask for money, and anyone would not be happy in their hearts.

Shi Hu said: "What do you want to do to build this strong army? Your Han army is already powerful enough, there is no need to spend money to build a strong army, right? ”

"King!" Shi Min lowered his hand and said, "As the old saying goes, soldiers are expensive and fine, not too expensive." You also know the previous battle of Changli, my Zhao army retreated with more than 100,000 horses, and Murong Ke only commanded 2,000 elite cavalry to chase and kill all the way, beheading more than 10,000 people! The strength of the elite soldiers can be seen! ”

"Your Majesty, you can imagine that each elite soldier can be used as one as ten, and the financial and material resources they need are only the amount of three or five ordinary soldiers. Isn't that a good deal? ”

Shi Hu thought to himself for a moment and felt that it made sense.

For the concept of "elite soldiers", Shi Hu still has it.

Elite soldiers, literally, must be elite soldiers, that is, individual soldier ability and weapons and equipment are much higher than ordinary soldiers.

So where is the "fine" of this so-called elite soldier?

Before the Spring and Autumn Period, ancient Chinese warfare was dominated by chariot warfare, and the soldiers were the children of the nobility (slaves and civilians could not go to the battlefield).

But in the Warring States Period, because the wars were too frequent and the scale was getting bigger and bigger, no matter whether they were Chinese or savages, as long as they were of the right age, they had to go to the battlefield.

But more soldiers do not mean that they are stronger, because the soldiers at this time are, to put it bluntly, a group of civilians gathered together, not only to consume food, but also to retreat when they encounter the timid when they see the enemy, I am afraid that no matter how many soldiers there are, they will disperse in a hurry.

Therefore, countries began to select those who were young, strong and bold from among the soldiers, and formed a combat force alone, which not only reduced the cost of raising troops, but also quickly defeated the other side in the face of the other party's rabble, which was the earliest concept of elite soldiers.

For example, during the battle of Qin and Zhao Changping, Bai Qi sent a surprise army of 25,000 people to intercept the retreat of the Zhao army, and forcibly cut off the connection between the 450,000 Zhao army and the rear, which shows its strength.

Later, in the Three Kingdoms period, hereditary soldiers began to appear, and they were mainly recruited for those areas with strong folk customs, that is, the "elite soldiers" were localized, like Zhuge Liang formed the "Wudang Flying Army" after pacifying Nanzhong.

In the ancient agrarian society, it was obviously unrealistic to completely turn the army into a professional and detached from production, and it was impossible to provide for it, so all dynasties and dynasties would still select some elite soldiers to carry out professional training and use them to fight tough battles while continuing the practice of using soldiers in agriculture.

For example, Lu Bu's trapped camp, the Beifu soldiers of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the Xuanjia Army of Tang Taizong, Yue Fei's Beiwei Army, and the Qi Family Army, Tianxiong Army, Guanning Iron Cavalry of the Ming Dynasty, etc.

These people were not busy with production, and their main job was training, and the equipment was often the most advanced at the time.

Shi Hu didn't know the strength of the elite soldiers, but Shi Min was still worried about forming a strong army among the Han army......

"Thorn slave, I don't know how many people you want to build this elite army? How much money do you need? ”

This is the issue that Shi Hu is most concerned about.

Shi Min replied: "Your Majesty, this elite army built by the minister should be 1,000 people. They must all be warriors who can be ten with one and are not afraid of death, and the role of this elite army is to charge into battle, and even break their morale in a battle! As for how much money is needed, this ...... The minister can't estimate it. ”

Shi Hu heard that there were only a thousand elite soldiers, so he didn't pay attention to it at all!

No matter how strong the elite soldiers are, what effect can there be in such a small number of people?

"Good. You take my edict and go to Shangshutai to lead the army! Shi Hu behaved very happily.

"King Xie."

Shi Hu immediately wrote an edict and handed it to Shi Min, and when he went to Shangshutai to find Shangshu Ling Wang Yan to sign, and then went through several processes to distribute military expenses.

Everything was as Shi Min expected.

Shi Hu, who had just gotten up, heard about this "trivial" little thing, and generously gave a check without a number, as for what the number on this "check" was, it was all in Shi Min's thoughts!

Shi Min, who had just come out of the warm pavilion, walked straight out of the palace, but when he passed by a royal river, he met Zheng Cherry and her personal maid Xiaocui.

At this time, Xiaocui was supporting the faltering Zheng Cherry and slowly walked towards the palace.

I ran into Shi Min head-on.

"What's going on?"

Shi Min saw that Zheng Cherry's face was pale, his breathing was very difficult, his lips were purple, as if he was frostbitten, and he was trembling, and his shoulders couldn't help but tremble, so he asked Xiao Cui.

"Thorn slave......" Zheng Cherry even spoke with a trill!

Xiaocui couldn't help but say with a resentful face: "It's all the queen's mother." Niangniang took the slave maid to the queen's palace to ask for sin, who knew that the people said that the queen had not gotten up yet, and we were here to ask for sin, so we didn't dare to leave directly, so we stood outside for about half an hour. ”

"The queen is really unkind. Deliberately make it difficult! ”

"Alright. Don't talk about Xiao Cui......" Zheng Cherry bit her lip and said, "No matter what, the queen has already forgiven you." ”

"!" Xiao Cui stomped her feet, looking angry.

Shi Min looked at Zheng Cherry's leg again, shook his head and said, "Broken foot?" ”

"Hmm." Zheng Cherry nodded unconsciously.

Standing outside for so long on such a cold day, blown by the cold wind, and a little ice crystal falling from the sky, it is conceivable that with such a pampered woman as Zheng Cherry, how can she stand it?

But Shi Min can't control all this.

"Take care of yourself." After Shi Min finished saying this, he walked away.

It's better to have a relationship with the concubines in Shihu's harem. Shi Min had been in the palace for a long time when he was a child and was raised by Shi Hu, but that didn't mean he could treat this place as his home!

Looking at Shi Min's back as he walked away, Zheng Cherry bit her chapped lip, her eyes flickered and blurred, and she didn't know what she was thinking.