It's not easy for the Emperor Zhou now. During the court meeting, the monarch and his ministers talked about trivial matters. Which village had a dispute this time, and what would happen to the people in which region tomorrow.
Major national affairs? The feudal princes all played their own affairs, and many even did not ask the Emperor of Zhou to seal the change of monarchy.
Of course, there were also princes who reported to the Emperor of Zhou when there was a change of monarchy, and only ascended the throne after obtaining permission.
It's just that compared to before, the indispensable procedures are not taken seriously. No wonder many people open and close their mouths to recite a few words of etiquette, and the fun is ruined.
What is even more tragic is that after the finances were exhausted, the Zhou royal family could not even play games for their own entertainment.
The army became an extremely luxurious thing in the Zhou royal family. The number of armies under the control of Emperor Zhou was not even as large as the private armed forces used by the big merchants of "Luoyi" to protect their business teams.
In the past, several generations of Zhou emperors hated the Jin State and repeatedly made trouble for the Jin State's hegemony.
Although the Jin State was only superficially submissive to the Zhou royal family, it at least protected the face of Emperor Zhou. This caused a bit of a rift between the two parties later on. In fact, everyone suffered a loss, and generally speaking, the Zhou royal family was more uncomfortable.
Why? Because the Jin Kingdom was at least full of martial virtues, but the Zhou royal family only had the ruined face of their ancestors.
The decline of the Zhou royal family made Han Geng go to "Luoyi" to return to the social circle of his friends. He didn't think "Luoyi" had anything worth mentioning.
When Zhong Wu heard that Emperor Zhou had sent an envoy to express his gratitude to Zhishen, his expression turned dull.
Except for Zhiyao and Han Geng, the others did not know that Zhishi's gift to Emperor Zhou contained ritual utensils from the Zhongshan Kingdom. They only felt that Emperor Zhou was indeed becoming worse and worse with each generation, and even licked his courtiers when they were greeted.
Then again, there is no shame in licking the "Yuanrong" of the Jin Dynasty. Many people want to lick the "Yuanrong" but they are not qualified.
They passed through "Wang Ye" and "Huang" and entered the territory of Zheng State.
If you go a few years in the morning, you can see farmland everywhere on the border between the Zheng Kingdom and the Zhou royal family, and you can even see a "state" ten or twenty miles apart.
Now? The Zheng State has carried out a strategic contraction of the Jin State. The land that was once farmland is covered with all kinds of weeds, and the "states" everywhere are abandoned.
"When will the Wei family go south?" Zhiyao asked Wei Ju.
Zheng Guo himself gave up, and moved away the nobles, and the common people were also taken away. They were creating strategic depth. The question is how big is Zheng Guo?
Wei Ju looked at Zhi Yao with a strange look and thought to himself: "No way, man! How can you just ask about such an important thing?"
That's right, any family's future plans can be regarded as strategic goals, and outsiders can't ask.
Zhiyao understood the meaning from Wei Ju's eyes and said with a smile: "If Qi is like this, how can the Zhi family live up to their good intentions?"
If you make it clear which direction you want to expand, it's not a secret. Asking it out shows your openness.
Wei Ju smiled bitterly and said: "It's difficult to stabilize internally, maybe it takes five years?"
Do you think that everyone is a Zhishi, and after swelling a large circle, he quickly digests it and can go into battle again with light weight?
Open your eyes and take a look at the other families in the Jin Kingdom. Which one is not carrying a heavy burden and making it difficult to move forward despite the good opportunities?
Hu You's chariot was nearby, and he interjected: "Next year my family wants to beg Bai Zhai. If you are interested, you can come."
Han Geng immediately answered and said: "There must be a Han family."
Is it so obvious?
This year they praised Zhiyao, next year it will be their turn to praise the Han family and the Hu family.
Zhiyao is quite indifferent.
Zhishi is training new troops, and they need to be tested in actual combat from time to time, otherwise they will not be able to train elites just by training.
Moreover, it is only a small-scale military use. Even if there is no need to test the new army, how can a family not fight all year round will be raised as a pig, and it is very likely that it will not even be as good as a pig.
After all, large-scale defeats often occurred in history. Tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of troops were eliminated within two or three days. When tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of pigs escaped, it would take more than two or three days to catch them, right?
Zhiyao said that she would support him, and the others couldn't be left behind.
The pain was still Zhao Bolu's. They lost about 70% of their territory, but still retained about half of their population. Their production could no longer keep up with their consumption. If they continued to use troops from time to time, it would definitely make the situation worse.
They first went to a place called "Beijing" and were really shocked by the courage of Zheng's monarchs and ministers.
This "Beijing" is considered a big city, but Zheng Guo still gave up as soon as he gave up. If he didn't have the courage to do it, he really wouldn't be able to do it.
"The city of Zheng has a wall outside, with at least three floors." Zhiyao stood on the inner city wall and scanned the city.
In fact, the city is not completely deserted.
After Zheng Guo abandoned the city, many savages came to the city to look for things, and many savages settled in the city abandoned by Zheng Guo.
The Jin army came over, and after entering the city, they frightened the barbarians inside. They ran away if they could, but if they couldn't, they trembled and waited to be dealt with.
Zhiyao believed that mosquito legs were also meat. If other families didn't want them, they would catch them and arrange for them to be taken home immediately.
The first one to follow was Wei Ju.
The Wei family is also very short of people right now. There are many places that need labor force, so naturally if they can catch one, they will be there.
Gu Chu
Not to mention, there were a lot of savages in the abandoned "Beijing". It's unclear how many escaped, but more than a thousand were caught, usually with their families.
Because many people said they didn't want it in advance, Zhiyao and Wei Ju certainly wouldn't be polite. Even if someone regretted it later, they still couldn't get a share of the money.
With this lesson learned, they later went to a certain place to catch savages and the like, and no one turned a blind eye anymore.
In this way, when they went south and did not engage in battle with Zheng's army, they captured people whenever they saw them. The number of people captured increased again and again. A considerable number of them were not savages, but mostly Zheng people, and there were also people from other countries.
"We are not from Zheng, nor are we enemies of Boguo." This man spoke with a Song accent and looked more confused than scared.
Zigong had a headache. He himself felt extremely complicated about the Jin army going south and arresting anyone they met.
Capturing savages, right? In fact, it does not violate the law in any country, and it does not even constitute a moral flaw.
In some respects, catching savages is a very correct thing to do, as it can reduce local lawlessness and supplement the labor force of each family.
To put it bluntly, no matter where they are, the savages themselves are an unsettling factor. Petty theft is common. If they are worse, they will rob, or if they are bolder, they will go into groups to attack a certain noble's village.
Why is no one taking care of it? One of the reasons is that the nobles clean up their front door, and then they can catch some, and more savages will run away after hearing the news. Long-term military use will cause great consumption to any family, and I think it is not feasible to do it.
A good deal.
Another point is that the captured savages will definitely run away if they are single and have the opportunity, which will cause the control cost to be a bit high.
Therefore, even if the Jin State repeatedly launched a campaign to capture savages, it was basically treating the symptoms rather than the root cause. During the period of severe crackdowns, the savages hid in the mountains and forests, and then reappeared in various ways after the news passed.
The Jin State, which was full of martial virtues, was like that, and you can imagine the same for other countries.
Zigong, who had obtained the power of disposal, had already dealt with the incident of accidentally arresting a merchant more than once, and had to let him go again.
As for casualties during the arrest? No one wants to see it. Compensation or something... don’t even think about it!
What era do you think we are in now? How can the military succumb to individuals?
It's actually good if you don't eliminate all the mistakes, if you play a trick, you can't be held accountable, and if you can't spread a bad reputation.
People who suffered unintentional disasters? What will they think about afterwards, but for the time being, they don’t dare to murmur.
During the process, Zigong encountered a caravan from the State of Lu. The fellow villagers would inevitably have more emotions when they saw the fellow villagers, so they apologized and compensated.
This kind of double standard was not a trivial matter. It reached Zhiyao's ears and summoned Zigong.
Zhiyao was silent for a while and said, "It's hard for the people of Lu to feel grateful for what you did, and people from other countries are even more angry."
How could Zigong not know?
Zhiyao added: "The army is a murderous weapon and a mistake. Why should we apologize?"
Zi Gong still understood this truth.
Let alone the age when etiquette has collapsed, even in the age of etiquette, if such a thing happens, there will be no second choice except to make the mistake.
When the army is involved, the monarch must be cautious and cautious. Why is it a retainer's turn to apologize when the army makes mistakes?
Zhiyao said: "You go to 'Xin Zheng', and if Lord Zheng cuts off three cities, he will pay for his crime; when the matter is over, go to Lu and persuade the three Huan to temporarily abandon 'Ai Ling' so that the Qi army can regain it."
In this version of history, Zigong traveled to various countries and redeemed the Lu people before returning home without looking for rewards from the country.
Whether the above-mentioned things will happen again, no one can say.
This time, Zigong followed him to Zheng State to deal with the Lu caravan. It seemed that he was affectionate and righteous to his fellow villagers, but it cost Jin State a lot of money. The guilt he was held accountable for could be large or small.
Afterwards, when they learned about Zhi Yao's treatment of Zigong, they did not think Zhi Yao was trying to embarrass Zigong. On the contrary, they thought Zhi Yao was being merciful.
"At that time, the city can be gained and abandoned again, and we will share it equally with everyone." Zhiyao said to everyone.
This is good!
Everyone looked happy, but Wei Ju was a little distracted.
What Wei Ju was thinking was that Zheng Guo could agree to that kind of thing, which meant that Zheng Guo did not dare to refuse when facing Jin State. Did the Wei family really want to give up such a good opportunity and resist the temptation to expand southward?
Zhiyao, who had been paying attention to Wei Ju, saw that look and thought to herself: "The Zheng State is now afraid of two things. It is afraid that the Jin State will be greedy, and it is also afraid that the Chu State will fight against the Zheng State. Compared with the possible greed of the Jin State,
The Chu State is even more malicious to the Zheng State because of Bai Gongsheng's existence. The Zheng State will definitely give in to the Jin State again and again until it can't bear it anymore. How can the Wei family endure the situation of Zheng State?"
Maybe, just maybe, Zheng Guo won't be able to tolerate it forever, and it will inevitably break out one day.
The Wei family will benefit a lot from expanding to the south, but the key is that the part they got before is not stable.
When it comes to expansion, the more the better in a short period of time, it’s really not the case. You might end up stretching yourself to death!
Even if you don't hold it to death, how much energy and time does it take to digest it?
After a series of thoughts, Zhiyao decided that the rapidly expanding Wei family was a good Wei family, and she was willing to be this good person.
