"What a disaster!" He Ming hurriedly got off the bullock cart in front of a manor on the outskirts of Dongpinglu County, said anxiously, and then choked.
"Where is Yidai?" He Ming was a little confused as he looked at the scene of everyone in the house.
"The master of the house died suddenly the day before yesterday." The person greeting the guests at the door said with a sad look on his face.
"What?" He Ming was shocked: "Hengyi Dai was always healthy, why did he die suddenly? Was he suffering from some sudden illness?"
The person greeting the guests looked troubled and said, "He Gong is a close friend of the head of the family. You can come in and have a chat."
He Ming calmed down, nodded, and just as he was about to step inside, he saw a large group of people not far away, supporting the elderly and the young, riding on ox carts and donkey carts, heading south.
"Why is this?" He Ming stretched out his hand and asked.
"These are my villagers, there are more than 400 households, and now they are all let go."
"Why let go?"
"It's a last resort."
He Ming was startled, and after taking a closer look, he found that there were actually soldiers escorting these common people - or should we say escorting?
He seemed to understand somewhat, but he didn't seem to understand quite yet.
However, he did not hesitate too much and soon joined the Heng Mansion - the Lu Heng family in Dongping and the He family in Fan County were small noble families that were gradually declining in Dongping and Gaoping respectively.
After He Ming entered the mansion, the door was quickly closed.
Beside the people traveling south, Shi Xian rode a horse, traveling slowly south.
He is from Kaocheng, and his ancestors were once nobles in the Later Han Dynasty. After more than a hundred years of war, his family was in decline and was in decline. As a side clan, his family was in even worse shape. He had already eaten the rice of being a soldier.
, I managed to survive until today, I got the position of the owner of the building, my life is better than before, but it is not enough to revive my family.
Because he became a soldier in Gaoping Prefecture, his family has moved to Rencheng and settled there.
There is a difference between Fu Bing and Fu Bing, and the gap is huge.
Take him as an example, he only has a pair of leather armor, which he bought with his own money.
There are also very few instruments. After the tip of the original bow cracked, it was only in the middle of this year that I saved enough money to make a new one.
As for the horse under the crotch, it is a new hair from the top. It is said that it comes from Guangchengze Ranch.
Shi Xian was very satisfied with this horse. It was only three years old, which was the beginning of the golden age of the horse's life.
The horse was gelded.
I heard that Guangchengze now has six to seven thousand horses, including three thousand mares, and of the remaining three to four thousand male horses, most of them are gelding except for a few.
Stallions that have not been gelded are stallions, which are generally the strongest and are used to breed mares.
The stallions that were gelded were used as war horses, pack horses, and draft horses, and were used repeatedly on the battlefield without mercy.
Actually this is normal.
It is not the male horses that determine the size of the herd, but the number of mares.
It takes eleven months for a horse to conceive to give birth to a foal, which is slower than humans, and it usually only gets pregnant once every two years, which is about the same as humans.
Of the three thousand mares in Guangchengze, excluding those that failed to conceive and the foals that were not fed, it would be good to be able to produce more than a thousand foals a year.
This amount is not enough to consume in two wars.
Therefore, horses are very valuable. It is really good that Chen Gong can be gracious and give Gaoping Mansion troops 500 horses.
Well, not only were the horses divided, but the people were also divided, including the more than 400 households they escorted.
Not everyone in the Gaoping Prefecture has enough troops. Shi Xian himself only has two households, one of which has five people, and the other has only two.
This time when the Huns invaded, the Lu Heng family in Dongping had a sense of luck and failed to harvest the grains in the fields in time, which became the supplies for the Huns. When the superiors came to urge them, this man was rude and procrastinated.
At this time of reckoning, the head of the family "died" of illness and his nephew was appointed as the head of the family.
Not only that, the Heng family also provided 100,000 hu of grain and 1,000 bolts of cloth, which were deposited in the county warehouse, and then gave away more than 400 households of villagers and transferred them to the soldiers of the government as a corps. This was a serious loss of vitality.
Shi Xian didn't pity them at all, it was only himself who was to blame.
If they could resolutely implement the strategy of strengthening the walls and clearing the country, the Xiongnu would not be able to successfully harvest enough food. Their horses could only graze in the wild, eating grass most of the day - eating grass during the day and eating at night.
How long will it take to dispatch?
But it's different when there is food. After the horses are fed quickly, their attendance increases greatly and their power increases greatly.
It’s simply an enemy!
Fine snowflakes were floating in the sky again, and the horse snorted unconsciously.
Shi Xian turned over and landed on the ground, leading his horse and walking.
As he walked, he gently stroked the horse's neck. The horse also leaned its head over and kissed his face affectionately.
Alas, I can't even bear to ride this horse on the road.
When will we be able to ride across Henan with one man and three horses like the Huns cavalry?
The ranch run by Chen Gong is out of business. The number of horses that are born in the first year may not die as much as those on the battlefield.
You still have to buy it, and you have to buy a mare.
As for the horses captured on the battlefield, they were basically gelded stallions and could only be used as emergency relief, not as a long-term solution.
A few days later, when more than 400 households were almost dying from the cold, they finally arrived at Xialou City, a "Longxiang Mansion" of Gaoping Fubing, surrounded by hundreds of Fubing families.
The common people lived in adobe houses, lit fires, baked dry biscuits, and waited in a daze for the soldiers to come and choose.
Shi Xian keenly discovered that there were more than two hundred households of ordinary people in Xialou City. When he asked, he learned that it was the Ren Chengjing family who "let" them out, and he burst out laughing.
In the livestock stables outside the city, hundreds of new horses have been brought, and the soldiers are taking them into the stables to avoid the cold.
"Where did the horse come from?" Shi Xian asked subconsciously.
"It's not ours. It will be sent to Dongping immediately and raised here first." Someone said, "I heard that Mr. Chen is going to set up troops in Dongping."
"Where did the soldiers come from?"
"The garrison troops who withdrew from Fangtou turned over one by one."
"Where did the money and food come from?"
"Money and food?" The man smiled and said, "Isn't the fine a lot? It's almost enough to last for a year."
"What about the second year?"
"Let's talk about it the next year."
"That's right. At worst, we'll look for money from those manors again." Shi Xian smiled and said, "If you don't accept it, use all your troops to destroy them."
"I'm talking about Shi Datou. I heard that a scholar bought your unmarried bride as a maid. At that time, you didn't even dare to let go of a fart. Now you are so proud?"
Shi Xian's face darkened, and it was hard for him not to punch the man.
After snorting coldly, he said: "With Mr. Chen here, we warriors will never do such humiliating things again."
The man chuckled and said, "I can't stand the scholars either. Yesterday I followed Zhang Changshi to the Jing family manor to collect food. When the men unsheathed their swords and strung their bows, those people almost pissed themselves with fear."
Shi Xian took a deep breath and showed a smile on his face.
There are 1,200 soldiers in a Longxiang Mansion, each with its own generals and commanders.
Although they are scattered in various villages, they have a sense of belonging psychologically: they are a collective, and if something goes wrong, someone will make the decision for them.
Wubao Shuai in Hengxing Township is not a good person. He often robs people as slaves. If he encounters passing business travelers, if there are not enough guards, he may be robbed and killed by them.
But they did not dare to bully the soldiers from nearby villages. Once such a thing happened, the lowest-ranking Sima from other departments would report it. After getting approval, at least 1,200 soldiers from the army would be dispatched, fully armed and often accompanied by others.
Other Wubao men recruited from this county and neighboring counties surrounded the offending Wubao and forced them to submit.
Why did the head of the Lu Heng family in Dongping "die" of illness so happily? There are reasons for this.
If there are no government soldiers in the county or even the county, things will not be that simple.
There are definitely not many soldiers in the county, and they cannot deter the Lord of Wubao. If the prefect or the county magistrate wants to recruit private soldiers from other Wubao or manors, they will see you as a bare-bones soldier and will not care much at all, so they may not be willing to send troops.
Therefore, government soldiers are the cornerstone of a stable place.
There are a total of 6,000 soldiers in the ten counties of Gaoping, which is a huge force. Otherwise, just because of the rumored way of asking for money, Prefect Yu would have died in an unknown way.
"I don't think it's that simple to set up troops in Dongping." Another man came over and fed the horse hay and said, "Maybe there will be a war."
"Oh? A war?" Shi Xian was startled, then smiled and said: "I also want to get an official position. A war would be a good idea."
"I asked you to go to Hebei to fight the Huns, do you want to go?" the visitor sneered.
Shi Xian choked and said angrily: "If the Huns are willing to dismount and fight me face to face, I will kill his entire family."
"Haha!" Everyone around laughed.
If you are a cavalryman, why would you dismount and fight with you? It is only right to walk you on two legs with four legs.
"I'm not kidding you anymore." The visitor said, "Gaoping and Dongping have set up a large number of troops, probably to deal with Cao Yi."
"Attacking Qingzhou?" Shi Xian asked.
"I can't say for sure." The man shook his head and said, "It's also possible to cross the river from Dongping and attack Yangping, Hebei."
Shi Xian lowered his head and thought for a moment, it was really possible.
If Chen Gong continues to attack Shile, he must start from Fangtou and march along the river. The soldiers from Gaoping and Dongping gather together and cross the river to march westward, so that they can attack Chen Gong's army from east to west.
If they attack Qingzhou, the army must gather eastward and reach Mount Tai, where they can break into Cao Yi's territory at any time.
No matter which direction you go, the journey is actually not far.
Shi Xian secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
When soldiers go into battle, they need to bring their own dry food and troops.
If the journey is long, the cost on the road will be considerable.
If we fight right at home, the burden will be greatly reduced.
In fact, they were impatient of expeditions, and if they continued to do so a few times, their wealth would be emptied.
"It's better to attack Hebei." Someone next to him gritted his teeth and said, "Half of my house was burned down and was just plastered with mud. If Shi Le is not pushed north, the thieves will still go south."
"Yes." Someone agreed: "I think Chen Gong doesn't have many cavalry. If Shi Le comes next year, he will still be unable to stop him. If he goes to Henan the next year, he will still be plundered. Instead of doing this, it is better to go straight to Hebei.
Push him far away, lest the house be burned down again."
"Cross the river and occupy Yangping. Later, let Shi Le plunder Yangping."
Everyone was very excited when they talked about defending their homeland.
Shi Xian listened for a long time and became angry. He wished he could follow Chen Gong on the expedition during the Chinese New Year, push Shi Le all the way to Youzhou, and get an official position by the way.
Chapter completed!