Zhao Xiaoyi has also been promoted to deputy commander, which is considered a commander level. He is mainly responsible for logistics and transportation, so he has been unknown, but in fact, he has appeared behind every battle.
At present, the long-distance transportation in Sichuan and Shaanxi mainly involves two types, one is ships and the other is camels. The ships are controlled by the Military Department. What needs to be made clear here is that the Military Department is a civilian official office, which is equivalent to the merger of the Privy Council and the Ministry of War of the imperial court.
, Responsible for recruitment, assessment, rewards, military status management, martial arts, militia, and the manufacturing, storage and distribution of food, military supplies.
However, the military power of the Military Department is very limited, and it cannot mobilize regular army generals and hundreds of thousands of troops on a large scale. The Military Department's limited military power is reflected in two places. One is to mobilize regular troops of less than 500 people within the state.
Secondly, the Ministry of War can mobilize local state soldiers and militia groups, which add up to 100,000 people. The militia groups of Gwangnyeong Province and Hazhou Province have 50,000 people.
The military power of the 350,000 regular army and the internal guard army is in the hands of Chen Qing. Chen Qing is the general of the Sichuan-Shaanxi Army. He uses the general's order to command various armies. Cross-state transfers of more than 500 people must have Chen Qing.
Qing's command arrow, and the marshal's tent in the Bashang military camp is his general's camp. He basically has to go there every few days.
Although the Military Department does not control the military, it also serves the military. The grain and military supplies in the Military Department's warehouses are owned by the military. The ships, land, and buildings also belong to the military and the Finance and Taxation Transfer Department.
, it has nothing to do with civilian warehouses such as money and supplies.
The camel camp controlled by Zhao Xiaoyi belonged to the military, with 5,000 people and 40,000 camels. There were originally 60,000 camels, of which 20,000 camels were allocated to the Finance and Taxation Transfer Department for the exchange of materials between Jingzhao and Sichuan Road.
.
In the official room, Chen Qing said with a smile: "I just learned yesterday that everyone calls you Camel King. This nickname is very domineering! It's very good."
Zhao Xiaoyi is much more mature than before, and has already started a family. His wife is Xu Ning's youngest daughter. She gave birth to a son last year, and Xu Ning named him Zhao Ning with a stroke of his pen.
Zhao Xiaoyi smiled bitterly and said: "I used to be called Zhao Luotuo, but now I am called Camel King. In all likelihood, it was changed by the God of Wealth. I guess he will ask me for a camel again."
Chen Qing chuckled, "He saw your report and learned that the camel camp added 5,000 calves last year, so he had an idea."
Zhao Xiaoyi knew that King Yong kept him here most likely for this reason. He quickly said: "It is not impossible to transfer camels to the transportation department, but at least he can improve the living conditions for the camels. I applied for the five buildings last year
The greenhouse has not been approved for a long time, I heard it is stuck with him."
"Okay, I'll remind him, but I'm letting you stay here to tell you that the Battle of the Central Plains requires a large number of camels. Don't lend them out for the time being. Take good care of the camels' bodies. You must be especially careful of being poisoned by enemy spies. You must
Strengthen prevention."
"I understand."
"How many camels are currently available?" Chen Qing asked again.
"Reporting to Your Highness, there are currently 45,000 camels, of which 5,000 calves cannot be used yet, and 2,000 female camels still need to rest, so the number of usable camels is 38,000. If the war does not start until May,
Then the number of available camels will increase to 43,000."
"I understand, go ahead!"
"I resign from my humble position!"
Zhao Xiaoyi bowed and slowly retreated.
Everyone in the official room had left, and Chen Qing came to the staff room alone again. He came to the sand table with his hands behind his back, stared at the sand table for a long time, and fell into deep thought.
In Juxiang Restaurant, Zhao Shuang and Zhou Hua invited Lu Wei to dinner again. According to Lu Qiao's reaction, Lu Wei had been quite impatient these past two days and was always urging for money, so Zhao Shuang naturally had to appease Lu Wei.
"Don't worry, Lu Sima. Judging from the time, my men should be on their way back. They can bring the money back to Jingzhao in about ten days at most. We will definitely pay the remaining money."
Zhao Shuang was very confident that he had received a handwritten pigeon letter from Wan Yanchang. Lu Wei would be of great use, so he asked him to comfort him and bribe him over.
Lu Jiao also advised: "Brother, don't worry, Brother Zhao and Brother Zhou are both kind people, and they stick to their word. I believe they will never break their word."
Lu Jiao sold a large amount of grain data to Zhou Hua. Zhao Shuang thought it was very valuable and gave him five hundred coins.
With money, Lu Qiao spent this period of time living happily and happily.
Lu Wei nodded, "I am reassured by the fact that you kept your word and stayed in Jingzhao. In fact, I am mainly worried that your men will encounter bandits on the road, which will cause trouble."
Zhao Shuang waved his hands and said with a smile: "Don't worry! With so much gold, people will definitely be sent to protect it. In fact, it is basically safe just after passing the Taihang Mountains and entering the Hedong boundary. The chaos is also in the Xiangzhou section, but if you don't take the mountain roads and trails,
Usually you won’t encounter bandits.”
"If you say that, I feel relieved. Come on! Let's drink."
The four of them raised their glasses and drank it all in one gulp. Lu Wei glanced sideways at Lu Jiao and said with a smile, "I heard from Lu Qiao that you gave him five hundred coins?"
Zhao Shuang chuckled and said, "Of course it's not for free. Brother Lu also provided us with a lot of valuable data."
Lu Wei said calmly: "I know that he gave you the data in the account book, but I want to remind you that some data may not be accurate."
Zhao Shuang and Zhou Hua were both startled and asked quickly: "What do you mean?"
Lu Jiao jumped up and shouted: "Brother, I didn't lie to them."
Lu Wei waved his hand, asking Lu Jiao to calm down, "I didn't say you deceived them, but there are some situations you don't understand, and I'm afraid they don't understand either."
Zhao Shuang asked anxiously: "Can Lu Sima be more specific?"
Lu Wei then calmly said: "Lü Qiao is in charge of grain, and the Sichuan-Shaanxi Xuanfu Envoy Department has three major categories of warehouses for storing grain. One is the military warehouse of the Military Department, and the other is the Finance and Taxation Transfer Department.
There are the Jingcang and the transfer warehouse, and there is also a barracks for the Bashang military camp. Lu Qiao’s account books can see the situation of the military warehouse and the Bashang barracks, but you can’t see the food situation of the Jingcang and the transfer warehouse."
Wang Shuang asked again: "We know that the Jingcang is just outside the West City, but what is the transfer warehouse?"
"There are five transfer warehouses, Huangshui warehouse, Lingzhou warehouse, Chengdu warehouse, Qinzhou warehouse, and Hedong warehouse. These are five large granaries. They are actually the sub-warehouses of Jingcang in various places. The five major transfer warehouses are just the first.
At the second level, there are granaries in each state, basically every state has them, so there are countless of them. Only the Finance and Taxation Transfer Department knows the grain situation in each place."
Zhou Hua scratched his head and said: "We only care about military warehouses, these civilian warehouses are of little significance to us."
Lu Wei shook his head, "If you really think so, you are wrong. Sometimes there is no distinction between soldiers and civilians. For example, in preparation for the war in the Central Plains this time, hundreds of thousands of grains were transported from Huangshui warehouse to Tongguan without going to the military warehouse at all.
You watched the peace and prosperity in Jingzhao, but you never imagined that war was about to break out because the army warehouse did not allocate food."
Zhao Shuang and Zhou Hua were shocked, "Is the Western Army going to attack the Central Plains?"
Lu Wei nodded, "Basically, all officials at my level know. The specific time for the attack has not been decided yet, but the military has begun combat readiness training, and all relevant departments and offices are allocating money, food and materials to prepare for war. We
The night before yesterday, the armory sent thirty ships of armor, bows and crossbows to Tongguan, nearly one hundred thousand sets, and thirty thousand military tents. You don’t know these, right?”
Wang Shuang's face turned pale. He suddenly stood up and saluted: "Thank you Lu Sima for informing me of the important military information!"
Lu Wei smiled and said nothing. He was actually following King Yong's order to deliberately leak the secret in order to make the other party believe in him more.
"This is not a major secret. At least twenty senior officials know it, as do generals above the commander level."
After a pause, Lu Wei added another instruction: "Although it is not a major secret, it is still a Class A document that cannot be passed on to others. You just need to know about it. You must not spread it around."
"We will never!"
At this moment, Wang Shuang could not wait to go to Xianyang immediately to write a pigeon letter to report major military information to Wan Yanchang.
