Chang Mao's worries are not unreasonable, and by now, the more than 20,000 Yuan army prisoners have become the biggest problem they urgently need to solve.

Kill, you can't kill, keep it, and waste military rations. Send it back, I'm afraid that it will add combat power to Naha's department.

"Is there anyone who wants to surrender?" Zhu Su asked Chang Maodao.

"There are those who are willing to submit, but there are not many of them. And even if there are one or two people who are willing to surrender, we are also worried that those people will engage in a fraudulent surrender. Chang Mao shrugged.

Zhu Su nodded, indeed, now that Naha's main force is undefeated, where will these people surrender sincerely. Even among them, there are captives from the Han people of Liaodong, whose ancestors have passed through generations under foreign rule since the pre-Song period. I have no sense of belonging to a Han dynasty like the Ming Dynasty in my heart.

Even if they were forced to surrender due to the situation, when Naha came out of the army, I thought that these people would definitely raise the flag "anyway" without any psychological burden.

But if it was returned to Naha directly, Zhu Su felt panicked in the bottom of his heart. He wasted a lot of energy, designed, and cheated, and finally captured so many prisoners, could it be just to transport these Liaodong Yuan troops to him Naha out of Shanhaiguan?

What did he become? Naha's troop captain?

"Can you arrange for someone to repair the city wall?" After thinking about it, Zhu Su asked.

"Yes, Lord Ru has been recruiting people to repair the city wall with the method of cash-for-work in Suzhou City in the past." The answer was the dog on the side, Zhu Su and his entourage planned to garrison the county seat, so the city wall of the county town would definitely have to be repaired. After all, when the Naha Exit Department learned the news, it was very likely that they would send a partial division to try to attack this county town where three Ming princes were stationed.

"In that case, let Lord Ru not have to recruit people to repair the city." Zhu Su said. "Aren't these captives idle, let them repair the wall, and when the wall is repaired, when they will be let go back to Naha."

"Even if it's chicken ribs, you have to think of a way to squeeze out three taels of oil. Otherwise, wouldn't we be in a panic? ”

"Let the captives repair the city?" Everyone present was stunned. Zhu Di thought for a while and said: "Although this method has been made, the problem of grain and grass is still unsolved. ”

"If you continue to keep these captives, won't you have to bear the same burden of their food and grass?"

"On top of that, we still have to allocate some of the food to help the victims. Where will this food come from? ”

"Hmm......" The Qiao woman was embarrassed to cook without rice, Zhu Su pinched his eyebrows with a headache, thought about it and said: "Since ancient times, all resource problems are nothing more than opening up sources and reducing expenditure. Now there is no thought about open source, and I can only work throttling. ”

"Dogs, pass the order, the army is short of food and grass, so the prisoners in the camp are reduced. From two meals a day, it was changed to one meal a day. ”

"Old Five." The dog had just arrived, and Zhu Fan came out and asked, "If you say it so bluntly, will it cause a riot among the captives?" ”

"Even if you want to give them less food, you should think of an excuse to get by. How can anyone directly tell them that there is a shortage of food and grass in the army, and they need to cut their consumption? Could it be that Fifth Brother, you want to deliberately stir up their resentment, so that you can find some people to come out and make an example of chickens and monkeys? ”

Since ancient times, the management of prisoners has deliberately provoked some thorny grievances and then killed them, so that other prisoners in the camp can be obedient, so Zhu Fan asked. Zhu Su waved his hand and denied: "Alas, second brother, your fifth brother and I have always used virtue to convince people, how could you use this bloody and violent means to inflict three indiscriminate methods?" ”

"Don't worry, I have my own way of making these captives obedient." As he spoke, he whispered a few words to the dog. The dog nodded and bowed down to do it.

……

The next day, the captives were escorted by Wu Wangwei and went to the rock mountain in the south of Changli County to mine masonry. These captives had already been confiscated of their weapons and armor, and they had been beaten by Zhu Su and Zhu Di brothers before, and they had lost much temper at this time.

Hearing that the Fifth Highness promised that as long as the Changli city wall was repaired, they could be set free, and these captives were even more excited, obediently tied their feet, and honestly went back and forth between Yanshan and Changli County, picking stones to repair the wall.

In the evening, a group of prisoners returned to the prisoner camp panting, and were about to line up to receive today's fried rice, but were told by the Ming army who distributed rice grain: According to the order of His Royal Highness King Wu, from today onwards, the consumption of the prisoner camp has been directly changed from the original two meals a day to one meal a day.

Tonight's dinner, no more!

"This ...... How could it not be! Why is it that we have only one meal left today when we have two meals on weekdays and then transported them to the city wall? What is the rationale for this? "There are captives who are indignant.

In all fairness, the treatment of Ming prisoners was quite comfortable, except for a small number of Ming generals who liked to kill prisoners (such as Chang Yuchun), most of the Ming generals adopted a humanitarian policy towards the prisoners under Lao Zhu's repeated orders.

Not only did they provide food on an equal footing with the regular army, but also those who were willing to join the army of the Ming Guards for their crimes and meritorious service, the Ming army also adopted a policy of treating everyone equally, and did not easily regard the surrendered army as cannon fodder, etc., and was even willing to give these surrendered fields and give them the status of military households. This also led to the fact that among the millions of Ming troops, even more than half of the Ming army were surrendered, and even many of the now famous Ming generals were also surrendered by Lao Zhu from all forces.

This kind of policy of being gentle with the surrender of troops is also one of Lao Zhu's major political skills. Under such a policy, from the Northern Yuan Dynasty to the generals of all the forces who fought with Lao Zhu in the past, they would not make any effort to fight to the death with the Ming Dynasty: Anyway, the Zhu family did not kill prisoners, and there were so many people who still paid homage to the prime minister after surrendering to the Ming Dynasty, and it was not a shame for me to surrender if I couldn't fight.

Therefore, most of the generals of the Yuan Dynasty who were captured by the Ming Dynasty would not actively resist. Anyway, they are all soldiers to eat food, where to eat and not eat? Whether this world is the world of the Great Yuan or the world of the Ming Dynasty, for these low-level soldiers, it doesn't really matter.

But now, the prince of the Ming Dynasty has actually cut their grain and grass consumption, which makes these captives a little dissatisfied. A few days ago, there were two handfuls of fried rice in one day, and there was only one handful left today, could it be that the Ming prince wanted to starve us to death?

"Want an extra meal? That's easy, too. The Ming soldier looked up and down at the captive who had first expressed his dissatisfaction, and then said, "This brother has the face of a Han man...... Isn't it that my ancestors are also my descendants of China? ”

"Your Highness said that my Ming Zhu family became the emperor in Fengtian, which is essentially the patriarch of all the Chinese people. Since he is the patriarch of Huaxia, there is no reason to let the descendants of the people of Huaxia starve. ”

"As long as you can prove that your ancestors were once my Chinese people, and not the Tatar invaders, you can not only get an extra handful of fried rice, but also some more wild vegetables."

(End of chapter)