…

Yangwu County, at the city gate.

Four big flags flutter in the wind.

One of them reads "Join the Army and serve the country", the other reads "Infinite Glory", the other reads "Jinwu Army", and the last one reads "The Last one, the black-bottomed flag is painted with a red sun, and there is a three-legged golden crow that looks down on the world in the middle of the red sun.

Just under these four large flags, there was a man sitting - a young general wearing a standard military uniform of the imperial guards.

This person is undoubtedly Cai Shen.

That day, Cai You promised to let Cai Jian build a battalion and recommend Cai Jian to Gao Qiu, Cai Jian visited Gao Qiu's house that day.

In the Ming Dynasty novel "Water Margin", Gao Qiu was portrayed as the first treacherous minister. He was said to be a gangster. He was favored by Zhao Ji because he kicked a high ball and became famous.

This is actually not entirely accusing Gao Qiu, but he underestimated Gao Qiu a little.

Whether Gao Qiu was born a ruffian is not recorded in history, but he is indeed Su Shi's "small history" (that is, the role of a little secretary). Later, he went to Zhao Ji's uncle Wang Shi (i.e. the Taiwei of Xiao Wangdu) to be a servant. Later, he was favored by Zhao Ji because he kicked a good ball. Then Zhao Ji asked Wang Shi for Gao Qiu, and Gao Qiu was lucky enough to take the "old minister" of the last bus, and suddenly jumped from a playmate of an idle prince into the officialdom of the Song Dynasty, and became famous in the officialdom.

but--

Gao Qiu’s experience is not just that.

Let’s not talk about it for now. Gao Qiu’s beautiful words have a certain foundation in poetry, songs, and can also use guns and sticks, and has a certain foundation in martial arts. It is not an exaggeration to describe Gao Qiu as “both civil and military”.

Just to say that the Northern Song Dynasty had regulations that "no border merits can be used for the three yamen without border merits." In other words, if you have not made border merits, you cannot control the Central Imperial Guard. It can be seen that Gao Qiu's experience is actually not that simple.

In the volume 1 of the Song Dynasty's "Biography of the Ten Generals of the Song Dynasty" "Biography of Liu Qi": First, Gao Qiu once served as an official subordinate of the Duan Prince's residence, and ascended the throne, and wanted to promote him. The old law was that he could not be appointed as the three yamen without border merit. At that time (Liu) Zhongwu was the border commander, and the emperor was appointed as the border merit, and he competed to serve as the palace commander.

This means that Zhao Ji wanted to promote Gao Qi at that time, but Gao Qi had no border achievements, so Zhao Ji entrusted Gao Qi to Liu Qi's father Liu Zhongwu and asked Gao Qi to serve as the military supervisor for Liu Zhongwu (the two of them commanded the matter properly in the incident of rebellion against Song by Zhao Huaide and others in Tubo, and Zhao Huaide and others surrendered again. Later, Tong Guan and Liu Zhongwu achieved another great victory in the west. They successfully surrendered the Qiang prince Zang Zhengpuge and recovered the Jishi army. Gao Qi also participated in this battle. Gao Qiu was promoted to the position of Taiwei with these two border achievements, firmly served in the third yamen, and in charge of a large number of central imperial guards.

It is precisely because of this that Gao Qiu and Liu Zhongwu's family had a deep friendship. Later, after Liu Zhongwu died, Gao Qiu recommended Liu Qi as the commander, which led Liu Qi, one of the four generals of Zhongxing, to the stage of history.

In addition to maintaining close ties with Liu Zhongwu's family, Gao Qiu also took good care of his former owner, Su Shi's family. Some unofficial history records that he "did not forget the Su family, and every time his children entered the capital, he would be very diligent in pension."

Gao Qiu did not forget his old kindness, which made Gao Qiu gain a good reputation in the court.

Of course, what really made Gao Qiu stand up is that he is well-behaved and kind, and he pleases his superiors, especially the emperor Zhao Ji, in every way - he plays with Zhao Ji, and he will not talk about all kinds of madness. Zhao Ji likes to build a large scale, so Gao Qiu turns hundreds of thousands of imperial guards into craftsmen to realize all his ideas for Zhao Ji.

Gao Qiu stipulated that all soldiers of the imperial guards must unconditionally work and work for various royal buildings and gardens.

If you are unwilling to work, you can do it, but you have to pay for hiring craftsmen.

Gradually, the rich soldiers of the imperial guards can be exempted from training; the poor soldiers of the imperial guards can only find a living to make money, but they cannot practice; more soldiers use the training time to learn craftsmanship skills and build a large-scale construction for Zhao Ji.

As a result, the army's "discipline was abolished" and "military and political failure" became a useless decoration that "people do not know the military and have no one available."

Even later, when the country was in crisis and faced the attack of the Jin army, the hundreds of thousands of imperial guards quickly collapsed.

In addition to being good at being a person and pleasing superiors, Gao Qiu also specializes in face-saving projects. The military bidding competition he presided over began with "there are four colorful boats, and there are hundreds of military plays on it, such as big flags, lions and leopards, barbarian cards, gods and ghosts, and zajus. There are two boats, all of which are fun." Before the bidding competition, he first played and beat, and the bidding competition later also had to create various tricks such as "spin Luo", "sea eye", and "jostle", which were quite lively.

This made Zhao Ji very satisfied with Gao Qiu.

Gao Qiu also rose step by step and gradually became the nominal boss of the imperial guard system (in fact, Gao Qiu did not mobilize the power of the imperial guards, and the power of the imperial guards was still in the Privy Council), and also became the nominal boss of Cai Jian.

Cai Jian, who is familiar with history, understands a very simple truth, that is: history is complex, and the intrigues of senior political leaders are even more complicated. If you want to gain a foothold in the court, you can only become a tragic hero with a righteous spirit, and you will definitely not be able to do anything. If you want to stop a treacherous minister, you must be even more traitorous than a treacherous minister.

To apply it now, it means: although Cai still has the Cai family behind him, for his own future, Cai still gritted his teeth and spent 10,000 yuan to buy gifts for Gao Qiu, and came to visit him with the gifts.

actually--

Gao Taiwei, who has hundreds of thousands of free labor, is not short of Cai Shen’s gifts.

But Gao Qiu likes Cai's attitude and current affairs.

Therefore, Gao Qiu personally met Cai Jian, talked to Cai Jian about his friendship with Cai Bian, and encouraged Cai Jian.

The next morning, Cai Jian went to the White Tiger Festival Hall to report. Although Gao Qiu did not meet Cai Jian in person, the minor officials below Gao Qiu happily took out the book and asked Cai Jian to choose the number himself.

After Cai Shen selected the number "Jinwu Guard" from the book, the little official took out a simple version of the defense map and let Cai Shen choose his own resident.

After Cai Jian considered it thoroughly and selected the garrison next to Yangwu County, the minor official led Cai Jian to the military armor and enthusiastically helped Cai Jian select 500 sets of good military armor.

In addition, the little official took Cai Jian to Moutuogang to pick up a hundred best war horses.

After doing all this, the little official did not stop there, but was very enthusiastic to help Cai Jian find a Dutou, and then asked Dutou to lead a hundred imperial guards to help Cai Jian send Cai Jian's soldiers and horses to Yangwu County.

It can be said that Gao Qiu is worthy of the 10,000 gifts given by Cai Jian.

Of course, Gao Qiu did this more because of the face of the Cai family behind Cai Shen. Otherwise, let alone ten thousand pieces, even one million pieces, he would not have to let Taiwei Gao do so many things.

No matter what, although the development of the matter was not a little different from Cai Shen's initial expectations, Cai Shen finally took the first step after he came to this world...
Chapter completed!