The geographical location of Jinzhou Tokyo is only valuable in Xiao Ming's eyes, but in the eyes of others, it is just a wild plain area, and it has been war-torn for a long time, the land is very barren, the surrounding hills and mountains are bare, and the vegetation on the mountains is almost used as fuel by the nearby people.

But this is indeed the largest coal mine and iron ore production area in Liaodong, and the iron ore mine and Panjin coal mine in Jinzhou in later generations are a large production area for producing high-quality anthracite, which is the area that Xiao Ming has long fancied and planned, and even more fascinated him than the gold mine in the gold mine map given to him by Xu Lizhuo.

Qian Baguang was assigned a glorious and arduous task by him, that is, he went to the Qingzhou Mansion of the Great Song Dynasty for him, and Zhang Shuye, the original governor of Qingzhou Mansion, was transferred to the disposal envoy of Denglai and the two prefectures to deal with the official corruption cases in Denglai and the two prefectures, and it is said that as many as 30 officials were implicated.

Zhang Shuye has great power this time, temporarily acting as the governor of the two states, handling all government affairs, Xiao Ming, who got the news, was overjoyed, and directly ordered Qian Baguang to ask to see Zhang Shuye, asking him to find a suitable port for himself on the coast of Denglai line, in fact, Xiao Ming's goal is very clear, that is, where is Weihaiwei, Shandong.

As the base of the Beiyang Naval Division of the Qing Dynasty, Weihaiwei was as strategically important as Lushunkou, and of course it was also a good natural harbor, but in the Great Song Dynasty, there was no real wharf, it was located on deserted beaches and reefs, and then there were islands where pirates and horses were entrenched.

The entire East China Sea and the Bohai Sea are definitely a pure land at present, the Song Dynasty did not have a policy of prohibiting the sea, and the coastal fishermen were also self-sufficient in their lives, and the ancestors developed this sea area very widely but not thoroughly, Xiao Ming wanted Weihaiwei here as a port wharf, which was basically the same as Zhang Shuye's idea.

At that time, the Shandong Peninsula, the status was very embarrassing, most of Shandong still belonged to the jurisdiction of the two Huai East Road, this road state capital basically did not have the degree of moderation, the reason is very simple, that is, this is the forefront of the strategy of the East East Road, join the Liao State to raise troops to cross the Xiongzhou line, and then down that is the vast Huai River and the Yellow River Plain, Shandong is the first to bear the brunt.

The land is not high-yielding, the things are not abundant, the people of the whole Qilu land are fierce, bandits are rampant, the common people are threatened by the floods of the Yellow River and the Huai River at every turn, and it has become a habit to flee the famine and ask for food.

The Song Dynasty did not set up a festival envoy here, the reason is that this is not an important place in Gyeonggi, and there is a forbidden army of Cangzhou camp in the north, and there are escort troops of Lianghuai Road and Liangzhejiang Road in the south.

Of course, Uncle Zhang is not easy to fool, he gave Xiao Ming a good coastal port for no reason, of course, he didn't know that this one was a good port, but this person had described the mountains and rivers of Liao alone, and he had an instinctive sensitivity to geographical mountains and lakes and bays, so Xiao Ming didn't despise him too much.

Therefore, Xiao Ming sent the next volume of the "Chronicles of the Mountains and Rivers of the Great Liao Kingdom" written and described by Ma Zhi to Zhang Shuye, and he could see the preciousness of this book at a glance with Zhang Shuye's eyes, and I believe that he should be able to convince Zhang Shuye that Xiao Ming wanted to build a supply base in the coastal area of Shandong.

Xiao Ming passed on the news through the flying kite and told Uncle Zhang: "If the Song Dynasty wants to seize the Sixteen Prefectures of Youyun from the Liao State, it will inevitably start a war with the Liao State, but from the topography point of view, if it can penetrate the hinterland of the Liao State by sea and cooperate with the army attacking to the north, then a great thing can be achieved!" ”

Xiao Ming continued to analyze him: "Now the war between the Liao State and the Jin State is very chaotic, the Jin State still has an advantage, and in the Liaodong region, it is the territory that has just been snatched back from the hands of the Jin State, and the Liao army is still in a very unstable state, this time is just a good opportunity, but the Great Song Dynasty does not have a port and wharf as a base in the entire Bohai Sea in Shandong, so the sea ships that he worked hard to build in Hangzhou will not have a supply base."

After reporting to the imperial court, the imperial court ordered the local area in Denglai to solve the cost and manpower problems, and Xiao Ming gave Zhang Shuye a reassuring pill to eat, and he alone bears the cost of the port terminal on the first line of Weihai, and Zhang Shuye can recruit workers for him.

After this whole set of plans was determined, Xiao Ming was a little anxious, because he currently had no available manpower, Gu Shouzhen presided over the entire Gu smelting workshop and Chengxi Iron Works in Hangzhou, which has basically become an experimental base for iron smelting and forging steel in Hangzhou, and Ding Jianpeng is the main cooperating personnel, in addition, Ding Jianpeng also has to establish his own laboratory to make explosives.

Xuzhou Taiping Iron Works has become a castle, including mine iron works, blast furnaces, cement manufacturing and other industrial bases, and all this is taken care of by Jie Zhicong, there is also the entire security base of Xiao Ming, the number of Tiger Guards has increased to 3,000 people, and Hangzhou is the training base of Tiger Guards, where Luo Wen Luo Dingbang has always been in charge.

Duan Jingzhu is now a follower of Xiao Ming, but he will always escort a large number of horses through Xiongzhou to Dingzhou in the Great Song Dynasty, where there is an important military horse base of Xue Bingchang's Yaxing Gang, and through various channels, the military horses are sold to the Great Song court.

This business earned Xue Bingchang a large amount of wealth, but there was a large part of Xiao Ming's share, so every once in a while, Xuzhou Tianping Iron Works would have a huge amount of income in its account, and the name of the account was called: "Horseshoe Gold" Xue Bingchang would not owe a penny to the account.

Another talent is also in Xuzhou, that is, the Jew Aiqili, who played a great role in the Jiaogang Lake Water Conservancy Project, helping Xiao Ming raise a large amount of money before the gold was shipped out, all of which were guaranteed by the credit of the Taiping Iron Works and borrowed from the wealthy magnates in Tokyo, but with all the gold shipped out of the secret tunnel, the gap in funds was immediately solved.

With the support of 600,000 gold, Aiqili's suggestion to Xiao Ming was to lend, and Xiao Ming said to him: "You can use small-scale lending to make a profit, but now it is not suitable for large-scale lending activities, he is planning a large-scale capital operation plan, so that Aiqili can be calm and patient."

The Great Liao State is currently in turmoil, Xiao Ming recovered Shangjing after a short period of return, the various vassal states in the Western Regions of the Liao State can not see the situation clearly at this stage, after the Liao Emperor issued a notice of the Spring Bowl Conference, he began to bring tributes and gifts to the Liao State to participate in the conference.

Because the 200,000 soldiers of the Jin State are approaching the Liaohe Plain, Emperor Tianzuo felt very uneasy about the back of the mang, so Xiao Fengxian suggested that the spring bowl conference should be changed to Yingzhou, which is close to Zhongjing, the terrain is very good, the grass grows and the warbler flies in the spring, the climate is pleasant, it is a more important grain producing area in Liao, and at the same time Buddhism is developed, there are many believers, and at the same time, where is the fief of the Jin King Yelu Aolu, there are many tribes of the palace tent forbidden army guarded, it is an important town in southern Liaoning.

This is a poisonous plan by Xiao Fengxian, it is precisely in the fief of the Jin King Yelu Ao Lu Hu that he wants to make some moves, so that Emperor Tianzuo can use this to suspect and alienate the Jin King Yelu Ao Lu Hu, many ministers in the court and the central government have objections to the change of location of this Spring Festival Bowl Conference, saying that it seems that the emperor of Da Liao is afraid of the Jurchen barbarians.

Emperor Tianzuo was also hesitant, but in the end he still believed the suggestion of Xiao Fengxian and the national teacher Bana Tieji, and this Spring Festival Bowl Conference decided to be held in Yingzhou instead, because Bana Tiejia said a word, that is, the envoy of the Xizhou Uighurs in the Western Regions actually presented the Buddha bone relics to Emperor Tianzuo this time! And it should be placed on the Yingzhou Wooden Tower Floating Tomb for preservation.

Such a grand Buddhist event, of course, made Emperor Tianzuo not refuse, so he ordered to change the location of the Spring Bowl Conference, so the post horses of the Liao State were tired of running on the road again, in order to inform the subject countries of the change of the location of the conference, the post men complained bitterly, this has just been notified of the subject countries, and now the location has changed, we have to notify people again.

Not to mention that the Great Liao Imperial Court is slapping a swollen face and filling a fat man, Xiao Ming is in the mansion of Shangjing, he suddenly received a letter from his eldest brother Xiao Zhonggong, which mentioned that this spring the imperial court taxes in various places are much more than last year, and many people seem to see that the Great Liao has hope for revival, which is all the credit of Xiao Ming, but Emperor Tianzuo still has no money to hold the Spring Festival Bowl Conference, and now he is going to envoy the Great Song Dynasty.

As for Xiao Zhonggong's position and envoy to the Great Song Dynasty, he simply said in his heart that the silver taels and silk that the Great Song Dynasty paid to the Liao State every year had never been advanced in advance, but this time it wanted to advance, which was unimaginable, which showed that the Liao State was now shameless, and such rude requests were all raised.

Xiao Zhonggong felt very embarrassed, this trip to the Great Song Dynasty was obviously impossible to complete this impossible task, Xiao Ming replied to him with a letter, in which Xiao Ming proposed a solution to the problem to Xiao Zhonggong, in fact, this solution is also very simple, that is, two words: "trade".

Only through trade can we solve the problem of Liao's economic embarrassment, and the Great Liao State can't let go of the ridiculous face or has to make a high posture of the suzerainty to the Great Song Dynasty, so the problem of Liao's lack of money still can't be solved.

Xiao Ming asked Xiao Zhonggong to propose to the Great Song Dynasty first, hoping that the Song Dynasty could export a large number of silk and linen fabrics and iron tools to the Liao State for trade, and then further increase the quantity of daily necessities such as salt and tea to expand the scale of border trade, and then extract taxes from the merchants on both sides of the trade, so that they could quickly make money!

As for the strictly controlled horse trade of the Liao State, in fact, due to Xiao Ming's troublemaking in the middle, it has basically existed in name only, and in just over half a year, the Great Song Dynasty imported 50,000 horses from the Liao State, and most of these military horses were rushed into the army of the Song Dynasty, and the Great Song Dynasty was able to quickly equip a cavalry team.

These things basically happened after Xiao Ming appeared, or they were inextricably linked with Xiao Ming, but Xiao Ming didn't know that because Xiao Ming's garrison in Shangjing also made the Jin soldiers quite constrained in the matter of Liao strategy, they always had 200,000 troops but did not dare to make any big moves, and they actually retreated north in February.

Xiao Ming was very happy about this, because he wanted to leave for a while, he wanted to go to Denglai in Shandong in person, and go to Weihai in person, in addition to seeing the port base in that area, but also to have a meeting with Uncle Zhang in person, but how to get to Shandong through the long border of Song Liao?

In the end, Xiao Ming decided to go by sea, cross the sea, directly from Jinzhou to the sea, cross the Bohai Bay to the Shandong Peninsula, but Xiao Ming still has to face a problem, that is, the frozen ice in the north of the Bohai Bay has not yet been completely thawed, there are ice cubes everywhere, and now it is impossible to pass the boat, and if you go now, you will be looking for death!