Wu Chudao looked at his brother-in-law and said fiercely: "You go there with the cavalry. If the people in Yiheli dare to resist, they will be charged with rebellion!"
Wu Chudao was also cruel and ruthless. The period for converting horses into mulberries in the Hexi Jiedushi Mansion was three months, which included the process of measuring the land, leveling the land, planting mulberry seedlings and selling the land.
Ganzhou has the most horse farms and the most fertile land. As soon as the news of converting horses into mulberry fields was announced, many wealthy gentry came to Zhangye City with money, vying to buy mulberry fields.
Nowadays, the price of silk is rising three times a day. Although the war in the Central Plains has seen the dawn of victory, after several battles, the silk in the Central Plains will definitely be rewarded to the meritorious soldiers.
Any businessman who knows something about the silk trade knows that Longyou has not had a stable supply of silk in the past three or four years.
Merchants in the Western Regions saw a huge product gap, and the price of silk rose three times a day.
Today, the purchase price of silk on the market in Zhangye has tripled compared with before the Anlushan Rebellion.
Moreover, the price of silk is still soaring at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Both the Byzantine Empire and the Kingdom of Great Food were rare stable periods in history. The aristocracy's consumption power was increasing day by day, and they were very eager for Eastern silk.
Food merchants swarmed into Longyou, scrambling for the few silks left.
Silk is the golden egg, then the mulberry fields are the golden chickens that lay the eggs.
These horse farms are all on good land. If you plant mulberry seedlings, you will definitely be able to survive. If you buy some weavers from the south of the Yangtze River and produce silk in Longyou and sell it directly, you will definitely be able to make a lot of money!
With this expectation, the governor's offices in Jiuquan, Zhangye and Wuwei are all vigorously promoting the conversion of horses into mulberry trees. Wu Chudao's eucalyptus is already full of letters. These are all letters written by dignitaries who heard the news.
Want to buy land in Zhangye.
Wu Chudao was forced to do nothing. The cavalry outside Zhangye City belonged to the troops and horses controlled by Hexi Jiedushi, but Wu Chudao, as the prefect of Ganzhou, also had the authority to call on the cavalry.
Although Zhang Hun was a little afraid of leaving the city, he was forced by the big families in Zhangye City to have no choice, so he had no choice but to agree.
Holding Wu Chudao's military order, Zhang Hun came to the cavalry camp outside the city.
The cavalry in the early Tang Dynasty were all soldiers recruited from the good families. These soldiers worked in the fields on weekdays, conducted military training during the off-season, and were regularly called up by the court to perform the tasks of guarding, guarding the border, and fighting.
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However, since the time of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty, due to the increasingly frequent border wars, the foundation of the imperial army system - the land granting system - has been damaged again. It has become increasingly difficult for the imperial army to maintain its own war horses and weapons.
Even in a place like Longyou where there are many war horses, it is impossible to recruit good men who can fight on horseback.
Starting from the Kaiyuan period of the Emperor's reign, Longyou began to recruit soldiers and conscripts instead of government soldiers.
The Zhechong Prefecture, which was responsible for recruiting and training government soldiers, has been abolished by the imperial court. Instead of setting up Zhechong school captains, county magistrates were allowed to serve concurrently. Since then, the government soldiers system has collapsed, and the Tang Dynasty has moved towards a conscription and recruitment system.
Recruiting soldiers means that the government pays for people to serve as soldiers. This cavalry camp outside the city is the soldiers recruited from Hexi.
These soldiers were originally idle people wandering around Zhangye City, some were brave and ruthless gangsters, and some were even habitual criminals in cells who were sent to serve in military camps because they had no money to atone for their crimes.
The imperial soldiers in the early Tang Dynasty were all children of good families, and these children of good families were eager to make achievements on the battlefield. It was only by relying on the soldiers from good families in Guanlong that the Tang Dynasty could calm down the troubled times in the late Sui Dynasty.
At that time, the soldiers of the government were very powerful in combat, and they often defeated more with less. Hexi also had elite cavalry troops, and they were successful in conquering the east and the west.
But today's cavalry are all local ruffians recruited from Zhangye City. These people come to serve as soldiers for military pay, and military discipline is much worse than during the period of the government soldiers.
Every time these cavalry are dispatched, they will take the opportunity to rob the people, and even kill ordinary people to claim military merit.
These cavalry were afraid to fight when they encountered the Tibetan army, but they were fierce and greedy when they encountered ordinary Hu tribes.
The last time they went out of the city to patrol the border, they encountered a tribe of Qiang herdsmen. These cavalrymen rushed into the tribe and captured the unarmed herdsmen. They then framed them as Tibetan spies and put them in jail for taking credit.
It was a glorious time to be a soldier in the Tang Dynasty, but now everyone calls "a good man should not be a soldier".
Even if a good man hangs out in such a military camp for several years, he will be dyed black by this dye vat.
Zhang Hun was originally unwilling to deal with these vulgar soldiers, but in order to implement the conversion of horses into mulberry as soon as possible, Zhang Hun had to personally bring Wu Chudao's military orders to the military camp.
The captain of this cavalry was named Sun, and he was originally a gangster in Zhangye City.
Lieutenant Sun joined the cavalry camp in pursuit of military pay, and was almost tortured to death by his former captain.
Fortunately, Captain Sun's sister was pretty, so he sent her to the former captain's house, and she suddenly became a celebrity around the former captain.
The former captain was promoted back to the Hexi Jiedu Envoy Office and recommended Captain Sun to take over as the captain of the cavalry battalion.
I don’t know if it’s because people of the same sex repel each other, but Zhang Hun just can’t stand this Colonel Sun.
However, Lieutenant Sun warmly welcomed Zhang Hun, because this time the order was not to escort a few scribes to the countryside, but to suppress bandits!
Since ancient times, bandits have been the most profitable, and they can't wait to go out of the city to suppress bandits every day.
Bandits can rush into people's homes to "search" them and take away valuable things.
If you see someone with a lot of money in your family, you can arrest the family and arrange for them to be suspected of being a bandit, and you can blackmail them out of several days of drinking money.
Anyway, there are many benefits to suppressing bandits, what? What if we encounter real bandits?
If you encounter real bandits, of course you will run away! You serve as a soldier to eat food, and you are a soldier just to eat food. If you really kill a bandit and lose your life, then you will have no food to eat.
"Captain Sun, this time the governor issued a death order and must kill the bandit! Ma Sanlang from Yihe is the most suspicious, let's go to Yihe to catch him first!"
Sun Xiaowei smiled and said: "Zhang Hucao, don't be anxious. It will take time for the brothers to assemble. Yiheli is not far away. We will set off after lunch and we will be back in the evening."
Then Lieutenant Sun called another soldier and said, "Go to the restaurant next door to get some wine and some food and drinks. I want to have a good time catching up with Zhang Hucao."
The soldiers also looked at their captain in confusion. Everyone in Zhangye city knew that Captain Sun and Zhang Hucao refused to deal with each other. What could they have to talk about?
After a while, Zhou Shi, dressed as a clerk, pushed a cart into the military camp.
"Mr. Zhou, when you bring the wine and food to the Chinese army's camp, the old rule is that the money for the wine will be posted to the account first!"
Zhou Shi immediately said: "It doesn't matter, I just go in like this?"
"Hurry up and send them in. The captain is entertaining guests, so you have to be careful!"
Zhou Shi immediately walked into the big tent carrying wine and appetizers. He recognized at a glance that the person whom Captain Sun was hosting for the banquet was Zhang Hun from the Governor's Office.
After serving the wine to the two of them and setting out the dishes to go with the wine, Zhou Shi carefully exited the tent, but he found a place to hide and eavesdropped on the conversation between the two.
Zhang Hun looked at the rich wine and asked: "Good wine! Why haven't I drunk such a good wine in Zhangye City?"
Lieutenant Sun said: "The wine shop on the west side of the city has changed its owner. The wine tastes good, so I asked the waiter to send it to the military camp."
"It doesn't seem right to drink in the military camp at noon, right?"
"What's wrong with this? Isn't it just to go to Yiheli to suppress the bandits? Let's finish the drink and then set off. After finishing the things, we can come back in the afternoon. Then we will go to the store for a celebratory drink in the evening!"
Zhang Hun picked up the wine glass. The wine tasted sweet and was the best wine he had ever tasted.
"Good wine!" Zhang Hun praised.
Lieutenant Sun continued: "Zhang Hucao, do you know my brother-in-law?"
Zhang Hun despised in his heart that the brother-in-law Sun Xiaowei mentioned was the former Xiaowei whom he offered his own sister to curry favor with.
That brother-in-law was ten years older than Captain Sun, and Captain Sun's sister was not his wife, but just a concubine.
However, Lieutenant Sun's brother-in-law was promoted to the military envoy under Jiedu Mansion in Hexi Province and was considered the number one figure in Hexi Province, so Zhang Hun did not dare to offend him casually.
Sun Xiaowei added: "My brother-in-law loves children and wants to buy some mulberry fields in Ganzhou for the son my sister gave birth to last year. What do you think?"
Zhang Hun also knew that Lieutenant Sun was not good at making lakes, but nowadays there were indeed too many people asking for help in buying fields, so he still said half-arrogantly:
"Sun Xiaowei's brother-in-law is the military envoy of Jiedushi Palace. He wants to buy land. Why not buy it in Liangzhou?"
The Hexi Jiedu envoy was stationed in Wuwei City, and Wuwei was the administrative seat of Liangzhou.
Fang Guan's promotion of converting horses into mulberry trees in Liangzhou was quite effective, and I heard that a lot of land had been cleared.
Lieutenant Sun sighed and said, "How can my brother-in-law be ranked in Liangzhou? I heard that the dignitaries who wanted to buy land had trampled the Jiedu envoy's mansion."
"This is not because my sister's natal family is in Ganzhou. If we build some mulberry fields in Ganzhou, our natal family can also help take care of it."
Zhang Hun knew that if he were to promote the conversion of horses into mulberries, he would have to rely on Colonel Sun's soldiers and horses. He had no choice but to say: "When the Ma bandits are defeated, I will definitely help the soldiers and horses to get a good piece of land!"
"You scholars often say that a gentleman has no jokes, so what he says at the wine table counts, right?"
Seeing that a vulgar warrior like Sun Xiaowei was still relying on him to suppress the bandits, Zhang Hun raised his hand and said, "No joke!"
Lieutenant Sun immediately raised his palms to high-five and swore an oath of alliance. The two of them were guests and hosts, and the past barriers seemed to disappear.
Having had enough food and wine, Captain Sun, who was slightly tipsy, finally ordered his troops and horses, and led a mighty three hundred cavalry towards Yiheli.
Zhou Shi, who heard all this, immediately sent the news to Li Daoyuan in Yihe.
Yu Xiaoxiao, who saw the news in the chat channel, looked at Li Daoyuan worriedly: "Captain, everyone is ready, are you leaving now?"
Li Daoyuan said with a smile: "Let the old, weak, sick and disabled in the village retreat first. The people from the mutual aid association will follow me, and let us fight guerrillas with the government and the army!"
Looking at the electronic map, Li Daoyuan, who graduated with a major in geographical surveying and mapping, already had a comprehensive plan in mind.