Since the capture of Lanzhou, the Song Dynasty has been deeply involved in this matter.
Not only did they move the administrative office on Xihe Road here, but they also continued to build forts around it. If Dangxiang sends troops to attack Lanzhou again, this time he may not even be able to touch the Lanzhou City wall.
After Li Xian left, Wang Hou was in charge of the troops. He, Li Hao and Wang Wenyu sat in Lanzhou and took charge of the repairs of the fortress.
Lanzhou City is now impregnable, and two pontoon bridges have been built to communicate with the other side to facilitate the movement of caravans.
However, recently there have been continuous tribes fleeing from Dangxiang to the Song Dynasty. Dangxiang cavalry patrolled here to capture the escapees, and even built walls in some places. At the same time, Dangxiang internal affairs also tried their best to block information from the Song Dynasty.
Only caravans or envoys approved by the party can travel to and from Lanzhou via the pontoon bridge.
Today, the newly appointed Qinfeng Road transfer envoy Fan Yu and the Lian visit envoy Sun Lu arrived in Lanzhou for inspection. Regarding the arrival of Fan Yu and Sun Lu, Wang Hou and others felt as if they were facing a formidable enemy.
Wang Hou took a group of Lanzhou generals out of Lanzhou City to greet him in person.
Fan Yu and Sun Lu simply bowed to Wang Hou and other generals, then declined all reception and entered Lanzhou City directly.
After sitting in court, Fan Yu asked Wang Hou: "Why have Lanzhou and Huangzhou been unwilling to set up a general judge?"
The administrative system of the Song Dynasty was from three departments to the transfer envoy, and from the transfer envoy to the general magistrate, this line focused on finance.
Lanzhou and Huangzhou on Xihe Road have never set up a general magistrate, making it impossible for the transshipment envoy to supervise the finances. This made Fan Yu very dissatisfied, and he questioned Wang Hou as soon as he entered the city.
Wang Houdao: "Previously, the financial affairs of Xihe Road had always been taken care of by the Department of Finance. To facilitate the work, there was no general agreement between the two states."
Fan Yudao: "It's not that simple. In the past two years, the imperial court has built the most forts in Huangzhou and Lanzhou, and there is no supervision from Tongpan. Please ask the general manager to come up with the accounts and show them to us."
Fan Yu was so aggressive that Li Hao, Wang Wenyu and other generals under Wang Hou were very dissatisfied.
This is almost a face-to-face accusation that they have embezzled money from the imperial court to build the fort in recent years.
In fact, when the Production and Construction Department was previously established, Zhang Yue made an unprecedented move and ordered the Xihe Road Manager to take over the financial affairs. But now that Li Xian has been transferred, the Production and Construction Department is vacant.
Qinfeng Road Transportation Envoy Fan Yu, who was in charge of the finances of the Qinfeng Road Economic and Strategic Envoys Department and the Xihe Road Economic and Strategic Envoys Department, came to audit the accounts after taking office. It was obvious that he planned to re-merge the finances of Xihe Road into the Qinfeng Road Transportation Department.
If Fan Yu wants to check the accounts, he can only let them do it. What's more, there is Sun Lu, the integrity envoy, accompanying him.
Faced with Fan Yu's remarks, Wang Hou could only reply: "Yes, Cao Envoy."
Fan Yu checked the account books in person, and had to check each payment. The magistrate of Lanzhou was now Li Hao. As a military minister, he was not proficient in accounting books, so Fan Yu was forced to be extremely embarrassed.
He had no choice but to ask the officials below to come up and answer. Soon, officials were called into the hall one after another and answered under Fan Yu's face-to-face questioning.
Here Fan Yu showed the demeanor and methods of a capable minister. Immediately some officials were caught on the spot because of vague answers.
Sun Lu, who was standing aside, said nothing and detained the officials in question. This scene made all the officials in the hall look extremely pale.
Fan Yu looked at Wang Hou, who was dripping with cold sweat, and Li Hao, who looked angry, and he knew what was going on.
"Okay, that's all for today! The others have withdrawn, and I have a few words to say to the manager."
Fan Yu put down his pen, and everyone in the hall felt like they were being pardoned.
Fan Yu stood up and saluted Wang Hou and said: "Don't be surprised, sir. I was appointed as a transfer envoy by the grace of Mr. Zhang. You are his proud disciple. How could I attack you? I apologize to you here."
Wang Hou heard this and said with a bitter look on his face: "Captain Cao, you scared me to death."
Fan Yu smiled when he heard this and said: "General manager, do you know why Zhang Xianggong ordered me to go to Qinfeng Road as a transfer envoy?"
"I haven't asked for advice yet."
Fan Yu spoke eloquently: "General manager, there are a total of three million people in Dingkou, Xihe Road, but only 800,000 are registered there."
"If the imperial court wants to take Liangzhou, it must first organize the households on Xihe Road and bring together the people, so that all local tribes can be used by the imperial court."
"As long as there are enough population taxes, seizing Liangzhou will be a matter of course."
Wang Houdao: "You are right, Zhang Xianggong really has far-reaching plans!"
When Fan Yu heard this, he thought to himself, "This is my opinion."
Fan Yu did not correct Wang Hou but said: "Manager, to be honest, you have already achieved great success, but I have just arrived, and I haven't made any achievements, so I ended up here."
Wang Hou knew that this matter was not easy, so he put on his hat and said, "It will be a matter of time before the Cao envoys become two governors. I don't know what the plan will be."
"Since we want to recruit Fan tribesmen to come down from the mountain, we must provide them with a livelihood. Although the imperial court has a strategy, it cannot support the people without the money valley. As for where the money valley will come from, Sun Lianfang and I have already figured out a way.
"
Wang Hou thought for a while and asked: "Clean up corruption?"
Fan Yu smiled when he heard this and said, "You can say that, or you can say it's a donation."
"To be honest, I am not ignorant. In the past, the imperial court wanted to defend Lanzhou and make progress from now on, so it was not so strict on local supervision. The imperial court's money was flowing like a sea. Without supervision, local officials and military generals took it.
excusable."
"But the situation is different now. The Battle of Lanzhou is in the past. The imperial court is not trying to kill the donkey. No matter how great your contribution is, the imperial court cannot leave Lanzhou unsupervised. As for this envoy, he said he is here to settle old scores, but as long as
If the officials below cooperate, I can let go of the blame, but if they are ignorant, then even if I am easy to talk to, it will be very difficult for Sun Lianfang to pass this test."
Wang Hou was a kind man, and he only had one sentence from beginning to end.
Fan Yu said: "People can't be too smooth. Someone must tighten them and pour cold water on them."
"After all, I went to the court for your own good."
…
Seeing that they had received Wang Hou's promise, Fan Yu and Sun Lu continued to operate.
In the past, there was no supervision on Xihe Road, and there were indeed many loopholes. Now that Fan Yu has come and caused trouble, it has indeed cost the people below a lot of money.
As for a few stubborn ones, their homes were confiscated directly by Sun Lu.
After a few days of consolidation in Lanzhou, a businessman arrived in Lanzhou City and brought a message from the Guiyi Army.
When they learned that a team of nearly 20,000 people had fled Liangzhou and requested to go to Lanzhou to join the Song Dynasty.
Suddenly everyone was caught off guard.
Fan Yu, Sun Lu, Wang Hou and other officials sent people to report to the court and convened the generals for discussion.
How to dispose.
Most of the generals, led by Wang Hou, believed that there was no need to accept these people.
They cautiously believed that this was a trap set by Xixia people.
Even if it was true, they believed that these descendants of the Guiyi Army could not have any real feelings for the Song Dynasty, and might be a trouble.
Deliberately destroying the current peaceful situation between Song Dynasty and Dangxiang.
Li Hao said directly, "As soon as the war broke out from Xiaoguan, the river and Huang blocked the spring in a foreign land. The Han people were talking nonsense, but they were cursing the Han people at the top of the city."