In Yanmen Pass, Gai Xun, who was naked and thinking about Wang Yi, was in a state of distress.
Before he moved the shogunate of General Du Liao to Yanmen Pass, he simply thought that the main responsibility at Yanmen Pass was military. But when he actually came, he found that he had oversimplified things.
In other words, he thought of Yanmen Pass simply.
He thought that Yanmen Pass guarded a military road, but in fact Yanmen Pass was a commercial road.
Yanmen Pass and Loufan Pass to the west guard the Yiding Basin and Taiyuan Basin, both of which are under the jurisdiction of Yanmen County.
Because Yanmen Pass is sandwiched between the Hengshan Mountains and the Luliang Mountains, there are many mountain laos in its territory.
The origins of these mountain squatters are also very complex. There are native people who have lived in this mountainous area since ancient times, and there are also some registered residents with their place of origin, but the majority are still refugees. These people may have committed crimes at the foot of the mountain and escaped from labor service.
, or there are some special reasons for going into the mountains, or maybe they can only go into the mountains to survive.
But no matter what the identities of these people are, they are all closely connected to Yanmen Pass.
This is not to say that these people cannot survive in the mountains. In fact, the conditions in the Hengshan Mountain area near Yanmen Pass are quite good. For example, there is Baotu Spring outside the west gate of Yanmen Pass. The gush volume is very large and flows directly into the Sanggan River. And mountain springs like Baotu Spring
Not in the minority here.
If there is water, there must be grassland, which can be used for livestock and farming. These also form the realistic basis for the deregistered households in the pass to continue to enter Hengshan to survive.
In addition, a considerable number of mountain people go to the mountains for logging.
The Hengshan area has high mountains and dense forests, and the Bingzhou wealthy people are happy to build country villas, so the demand for trees is very strong. This has also inspired a large number of refugees to go to the mountains to cut trees to earn money.
Not to mention, Yanmen Pass is an important road leading to the grassland, and countless business travelers travel through it every year. This also gave rise to the idea that Shanliao relied on business roads to exploit business roads.
Those who are careless will directly rob the business travelers, while those who are more careful will take the initiative to act as escorts for these business travelers. In fact, they are paying a protection fee in disguise.
It can be said that through private reclamation, logging, and extortion in Hengshan, the lives of these Hengshan slaves have become more and more prosperous.
But if they moisturize, some people will not.
Two groups are affected.
The first one is the Taiyuan County Government.
Because almost all the people who continue to flee into the Hengshan Mountain Area escape from Taiyuan County. Since you can open up private land in Hengshan Mountain, you don’t have to pay taxes, let alone be exploited by local powerful people, so the Guizhou head of Taiyuan County is always
He tried his best to escape to Mount Heng.
In other areas, fleeing into the mountains from the plains is a hardship, but here in Hengshan, you are enjoying happiness. How great is the temptation!
The most important aspect of the Han family's assessment of local county governors was the tax payer population. Therefore, the Taiyuan governor was deeply concerned about the loss of population under his rule.
In addition to the Taiyuan County officials suffering, the military at Yanmen Pass also suffered a huge headache.
Because these Shanliao are very unscrupulous and often collude with the barbarians outside the customs. Some simply resell some supplies, and some even serve as the eyes and ears of those people.
For example, in the first year of Emperor An's reign of Emperor Yanguang, the Xianbei people led tens of thousands of people to control Yanmen and Dingxiang in October. At that time, Yanmen Pass was broken due to the back stabbing of these Shanliao. By November, Xianbei had reached Taiyuan.
It is precisely because of the existence of such a group of people without kings and fathers in Hengshan Mountain that there are hidden dangers in the defense of Yanmen Pass.
So around the time of Emperor Shun, at the suggestion of Situ Hu Guang, the court finally began to cleanse the Shanliao people entrenched in Hengshan.
After a hundred years of development, the amount of private land opened up by Shanliao people in Hengshan has been considerable. Therefore, not only the troops from Yanmen Pass began to enter the mountain, but the powerful men from Taiyuan and Yanmen also began to spontaneously enter the mountain to clear out Shanliao.
With the entry of powerful local factions, private lands in Hengshan were re-divided.
Among them, the military at Yanmen Pass gained the most. Not only did they occupy a considerable part of the land and transfer it to military camps, but they also recruited elite warriors from the mountain camps into the army.
Other wealthy families, such as the Xun family and Linghu family in Taiyuan, the Jia family in Jiexiu, the Wen family and Wang family in Qixian County, the Wang family in Jinyang, and the Guo family in Yangqu, also gained a lot.
They built forts in the mountains, cultivated land, and absorbed mountain huts, and their strength grew step by step.
No one knows how much profit these people have made. But it can be seen by just saying one thing.
One year, the Xianbei people went south to Yanmen again. At that time, Taiyuan was short of food and fodder, so they asked various wealthy families to help organize the event.
At that time, people from the Guo family in Yangqu said:
"My strength is enough to support thousands of armies, and it is my duty to lose for the Holy Emperor."
Then the Guo family really united with several powerful people to take care of the grain for that year.
From then on, the strength of Taiyuan's wealthy families was known to the world.
When the army and local wealthy families entered Hengshan, the original dilemma did not change.
Whether it is private reclamation, logging or smuggling, it is more prevalent than before.
The Yanmen Gate guards who were supposed to ban the people are now shielding and protecting these people. In other words, the interests under the water did not disappear because of the government's ban, but were transferred from the hands of the refugees to the powerful hands of Taiyuan.
Because these Taiyuan powerful people have deep interests in the Yanmen Pass area, they are very opposed to the closure of the gate.
Every time Yanmen Pass is closed, their losses increase.
As a result, the relationship between Gai Xun and the powerful people in Taiyuan became increasingly tense.
Yanmen Pass is a comprehensive defense built on the natural dangers of Mount Hengshan. It has a total of eighteen gaps. Gai Xun himself guarded Taihe Ridge, which is where the main body of Yanmen Pass is located.
But in other gaps, Gai Xun's military orders could not be effectively implemented.
Over the past hundred years, Taiyuan's powerful people have penetrated the Yanmen Pass defenders very seriously. There are eighteen gaps, and there are their people in each gap.
Gai Xun wants to lock the pass, but the powerful people in Taiyuan don't. If you guard Taihe Ridge, they will leave through Huyukou. You have been waiting for a while, can you still let these local snakes go?
Therefore, Gai Xun discovered that the Yanmen Pass defense system he had built with all his heart was full of loopholes. Often, as soon as he inspected a gap, the people on his back would open and close the door for those powerful caravans.
Lawless, lawless.
At this time, on the barrier wall of Yanmen Pass, Gai Xun personally gathered all the defense chiefs from the other seventeen gaps together.
Gai Xun was heartbroken:
"Now the war is coming, and Taishan's army has already reached Pingcheng. At this time, you are still transporting power for your own selfish interests. Even if you are not loyal, aren't you afraid that your family members in the rear will be killed by your short-sighted behavior?
?It’s so heartless!”
Everyone present was scolded into silence, and no one spoke.
Gai Xun sighed, knowing that these people were useless and would not listen no matter how much they said.
At this time, he was very lucky that he had temporarily recruited three thousand knights from the Southern Huns. It was with these people that Gai Xun had a usable army, otherwise the powerful people in Taiyuan would have been able to manipulate him even more.
Gai Xun also regarded these Hun knights as his trump card. Not only did he equip Yanmen's treasury to equip them, but their food supply was also the best in the army.
Each of these Hun knights has three war horses, five ring-headed knives, and each rider also has two leather collars, three hard bows, and a full load of fifty arrows.
It can be said that this class of cavalry regiment is the best in Northern Xinjiang.
That is to say, it was the rich reserves of Yanmen Pass in the past dynasties that allowed Gai Xun to be so extravagant.
This was Gai Xun's response. Since he could not count on the side wall of Yanmen Pass, he decided to rely on these three thousand knights to directly fight in the field.
Therefore, he spent most of his time training these people, trying to make them learn the Han family's fighting methods in the shortest possible time.
When the time comes, the knights who have both the strengths of Hu and Han will become the sharpest weapons in Gai Xun's hands.
However, the war came much earlier than Gai Xun expected.
The vanguard of the Taishan Army had already arrived at Yin Pavilion along the Sanggan River, and the war broke out.
…
On the east bank of the Sanggan River, Lu Xiang's banner was firmly planted in the square formation.
At this time, the entire army of two thousand officers and soldiers were lined up in a neat square formation and waiting.
Opposite them, a Han army of more than 500 knights was looking at them eagerly.
Lu Xiang sat on the chariot and carefully observed the enemy troops on the opposite side.
This was a typical Hun cavalry regiment. Although they were wearing the crimson uniforms of the Han army, he could smell the smell even from such a distance.
Lu Xiang had fought with the Huns. These people were much weaker than the Han knights, and they did not dare to attack his own strong formation.
But this cavalry is different. The equipment is too good and something is wrong.
Therefore, Lu Xiang sought stability and ordered all his troops to form a standard anti-cavalry square formation. The infantrymen were outside, and there were long archers and cavalry inside.
The Huns were not sure about these Taishan troops, and they did not move for a long time. Later, I don't know who gave the order, and the five hundred Hun knights began to speed up.
Lu Xiang's heart skipped a beat, he had never thought that these Huns would really dare.
Infantry has a natural disadvantage against cavalry. Even if a strong formation is set up, the opponent can still tear his formation apart as long as he attacks regardless of damage.
But now the enemy cavalry has charged, and Lu Xiang can only wait for the result.
Soon, when the Hun knights rushed into the Taishan army's arrow shooting range, the longbowmen took the lead in collecting arrows.
The first ones were light arrows marking distances.
When the Hun knights continued to move forward, the longbowmen had already replaced their heavy arrows with a round of mounted fire.
Dense arrows covered the sky and covered the charging front of the Hun knights, causing them to fall on their backs.
Naturally, these Hun knights began to slow down, and some of the knights on the periphery even broke away from the line.
Lu Xiang laughed and shouted:
"The Huns are still so ratty!"
At this moment, arrows were fired from the Hun knights on the opposite side. The arrows landed on the soldiers in the front of the Taishan Army and made a tinkling sound.
The Xiongnu cavalry regiment began to run in front of the formation to attack and shoot, giving full play to their proud riding and shooting skills, but unfortunately they could not harm the Taishan army.
Taking Lu Xiang's fully-staffed military unit as an example, there are 2,000 officers and soldiers in the army, of which 70% are armored soldiers, and the remaining 30% are shooting units.
It can be said that as long as these Huns don't make up their mind to charge into battle, their cavalry and shooting will be a nuisance to the Taishan Army.
There was a whining sound breaking through the air, and then there was the sound of clanking armor, which made Lu Xiang feel at ease.
Suddenly, Lu Xiang felt a pain in his chest, then his breathing became stagnant, and he felt a little nauseous.
Looking down again, he saw an armor-piercing arrow stuck squarely in his breastplate.