Lanzhou is vast and sparsely populated, and most of the military dependents live in cities or camps. However, as long as they don't stay in the cities, they may be watched from behind by the Cai Mansion's spies without noticing.
However, in order to prevent any flaws in their schedule, Xu Huai and the others set out from the villa early the next morning and drove along the post road to Lanzhou Stone Field in the afternoon.
The stone quarry is located in a stone valley halfway up the northern foothills of Guanxun Mountain. It is full of blue-gray mottled schist rock formations.
Xu Huai and the others parked their horses on a hillock, and could clearly see the stone quarry quarrying:
Thousands of people in the working area were dressed in rags and their faces were covered with dirt. They were obviously migrant prisoners who had been sent to Lanzhou to work as hard labor. At this time, they were driven to the quarry working area, and they used simple tools such as iron picks to knock off the blue-gray stones.
The baskets were carried on the shoulders and carried to the rock pile outside.
At this time, hundreds of mules and horses, which were so skinny and skinny, were led to the rock dump, but they had not yet been loaded with materials. Most of the mules and horses had their heads down and were eating grass stems on the roadside.
There are two to three hundred Xiang soldiers responsible for transporting stones. Most of them look very thin. They are responsible for loading the stones from the rock dump into bamboo baskets and transporting them by mules and horses to the north side wall and the construction site of the village.
Although the Xiang army is a standing force in each state, it is mainly used for hard work such as road construction, city building, transportation, etc., and most of them are thin, old and weak.
It would be great if the veteran soldiers of the Xiang Army got the opportunity to work in the post house or the government office. They usually have little training, and their armor and equipment are very crude.
At least in the group of Xiang army generals who were responsible for transporting the stone, except for a few battalion generals, all of whom were generals, Xu Huai did not see any ordinary soldiers carrying weapons.
In addition to these wandering prisoners and the transport troops, there were more than a hundred well-dressed soldiers inside and outside the stone field, all wearing the uniforms of the Tianxiong Forbidden Army.
In order to prepare for the joint attack on Yan, the court began last year to transfer prisoners from Bianliang Prefecture to Landai and other border states on a large scale. On the one hand, the number of prisoners transferred there increased sharply, and on the other hand, the number of prisoners transferred there increased.
On the other hand, the Lanzhou stone quarry is too close to the border. In order to prevent prisoners from escaping to Yanland, and even to prevent the risk of riots, Lanzhou has also mobilized the Imperial Army generals to supervise the custody. This is what Xu Huai and the others did when they were in Taiyuan.
Things to know.
On the outside of the stone yard, there are the stone yard official residence and the stone yard prison camp.
Standing on the hillock, everyone can have a panoramic view of the layout there.
The Shichang official residence is a courtyard with more than ten rooms, connected with a heavily guarded warehouse; the prison barracks are built near the official residence, with sparse fences and walls. It can be said that the barracks inside are basically made of a few logs and piles of
The shack made of thatched grass is crude and crude.
The Walled City of the Caocheng Inspection Department is located outside the valley entrance, only a thousand steps away from the stone field.
Unlike the Inspection Departments of inland prefectures and counties, the Border Prefecture Inspection Departments take care of border defense, bandit preparedness and other matters. The scale of the weapons and troops under their jurisdiction is far beyond that of the Inspection Departments of inland prefectures and counties. Inspection officers usually
The generals and generals of the Imperial Guard also serve as officials.
The Caocheng Inspection Department is not allowed to interfere in the affairs of border states and counties other than border defense and bandit preparedness. However, the stone field, which is used to supervise the work of prison prisoners and the forbidden army responsible for transporting stones, is under the jurisdiction of the Caocheng Inspection Department.
, and also went back to Caochengzhai to camp at night.
"We spent a lot of effort to get the list of prisoners who were assassinated, but we haven't been able to arrange the people into the stone quarry. We can't see any flaws from the list alone..." Su Laochang said on horseback.
Not to mention the Forbidden Army, the Xiang Army generally has fixed generals, and their sources are relatively clear. As long as there are no problems with the leading generals, there is no need to worry about fake Cai Mansion assassins among the ordinary generals.
At present, Tongbai Mountain is recruiting bandit soldiers, and nearly two thousand people have been separated and incorporated into the Forbidden Army of various tribes in Lanzhou. However, Zheng Hui, Dong Qifeng and other troublemakers have all been killed. Dong Cheng said to Chen Zixiao,
Zhong Changqing and other thief chiefs are full of wariness. Xu Huai, Su Laochang and others can now confirm that none of the thief soldiers who were recruited into the Lanzhou Forbidden Army were recruited by Dong Cheng.
nail.
However, the sources of prisoners for assassination are complicated, and a new batch will be sent here every once in a while, so they are most vulnerable to manipulation.
Su Laochang and the others secretly focused on the thousands of assassinated prisoners, but they haven't found any problems yet.
"Cai Ting is confident that he can succeed by joining forces to defeat Yan, and his achievements will be lasting for a long time to come. By then, I, Wang Zhen, will become a clown,"
Wang Zhen felt that Xu Huai, Su Laochang and the others were too cautious, and said with bitter emotion,
"He kicked me to Lanzhou this time just to open my eyes and see how his brilliant achievements are forged. He may not even want to take my life. Don't worry too much about me..."
"Maybe. We will do it casually and won't hinder anything!" Xu Huaifeng said calmly.
Su Laochang just smiled lightly and did not try to refute or persuade Wang Zhen.
Xu Huai didn't want to reveal his true life experience, nor did he want to revive old grudges, but even if it was to deal with his father, Xu Wuqi, and Su Laochang's forbearance and tragic sacrifice over the years, he would not do it if he had the chance.
Let Cai Ting go.
What's more, after Xu Wuqi "took refuge" with Dong Cheng after the Tongbai Mountain bandits rebelled against Jingping, he also insisted on looking for opportunities to lurk around Cai Qing, which made them unable to sit idly by.
To put it bluntly, Zhufengtang at this time was no longer fighting against the Cai Mansion just to protect Wang Zhen.
This time they actually went to fight the Cai Mansion in the name of protecting Wang Zhen.
There is a huge difference between the two.
The former's purpose is to protect Wang Zhen, while the latter's secret fight with the Cai Mansion is their real purpose.
However, protecting Wang Zhen became a means for them to hide their true intentions, so that Cai Zheng and his disciples would not think of Xu Huai's life experience.
Xu Huai would not reveal his life experience to Wang Zhen and Lu Xiong, so he would not be able to explain their purpose at this level.
Of course, Xu Huai used every opportunity to grow stronger and refine the strength of Zhufengtang, in order to prepare for the catastrophic disaster that would come in the first year of Jianhe.
He did not hide this purpose from Wang Zhen, Lu Xiong and the others, but Wang Zhen and Lu Xiong still felt that he was making unfounded worries.
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There are only three old officials in the stone field, which was directly deployed by Wang Zhen after he took office.
The Inspector of Caocheng is also a commander of the Tianxiong Army. In addition to controlling the rural soldiers and Xiang soldiers, he personally leads a battalion of 500 soldiers of the Tianxiong Army to be stationed here. The security of the Lanzhou Stone Field is under his control.
Responsible.
In addition to many subordinate officials, the Caocheng Inspection Department also has a Xiangbing Commander, who is sent by the State Military and Horse Supervisory Department to be responsible for stone transportation and other matters.
At this time, the Prefectural Governor's Office set up a prison camp in the quarry to receive more than a thousand prisoners sent from various places to serve as hard labor in the quarry.
The prison camp management camp is under the jurisdiction of the State Manager Yuan and is responsible for the state manager joining the army. There are also dozens of soldiers in the prison camp who serve as jailers.
Although the relationship was complicated, because Guo Zhongxiong was in charge of the military and political affairs of Lanzhou, he had the power to appoint Zeng Run to coordinate all matters related to the quarry.
Zeng Run had not come out to cause trouble at this time. Wang Zhen entered the stone quarry to hand over the job without encountering any obstacles.
Seeing that there is nothing unusual here, except Han Qi and Tang Qing, who stayed with Lu Xiong and Lady Zhai to take care of Wang Zhen, who was still young and in poor health as usual, Xu Huai took Xu Xin'an, Tang Pan and the other girls.
Then we left the quarry and headed towards Fuzhou from the mountain road west of the quarry.
All this made them seem that their trip was just to safely escort Wang Zhen to the Lanzhou Stone Field for his appointment.
After leaving Langu County, Liu Qiong'er and her daughters secretly went to the villa with Su Laochang. Xu Huai, Xu Xin'an, and Tang Pan took advantage of the time when the Yue-Yan border was not yet completely tense and crossed the border in disguise.
Line, enter Shuozhou, and wait and see the situation in Yunzhong.
Dai Viet decided to join forces to replace Yan, and the Khitan people would not be completely unaware of the movements in Landai and other places.
In Lanzhou, to the north of Daizhou, the Khitan people used the old city of Datong as their Xijing, and set up the Xijing Road Left-behind Department to take charge of the military and political affairs of Datong, Yun, Shuo and other places.
Xu Huai and the others saw no signs of the Khitans sending more troops to Xijing Road, but the patrols were much tighter than expected, so they did not dare to pry deep into Datong and Yunzhong.
There are various signs that the Khitan people are sufficiently wary of Dai Viet's movements, but it is very likely that they are under great military pressure from the Chihu people in the north and have no way to send more reinforcements to Yunzhong and Datong.
To be honest, had I not had a clearer and more thorough understanding of the combat effectiveness of the Dai Viet Forbidden Army and the shortcomings of Dai Viet's more than 100 years of civil and military regulation over the past year, and had not the memory fragments that emerged in my mind been so clear, Xu Huai would have
I can't help but think that now is a golden opportunity to regain Yanyun's old land.
Even so, until the Chihu people completely annihilated the main force of the Khitan troops and captured and digested their thousands of miles of territory, Xu Huai did not feel that Vietnam's military operations in Lan, Fa and other places were really problematic.
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After all, the Khitans' garrison on Xijing Road was limited. Even if the Privy Council organized troops from Lan, Dai and other places to go north to attack, the Khitans would not have the ability to counterattack on the western front.
This made Xu Huai feel at ease. He secretly felt that the first year of Jianhe was still some years away. Even if the Chihu people captured the entire Yan Kingdom, it would take some time to digest it.
Seeing that they were continuing their adventure to Beitai, Xu Huai, Tang Pan, and Xu Xin'an crossed the border again from the junction of Fuzhou and Lanzhou and returned to Lanzhou Stone Field half a month later, but they had already happened at Lanzhou Stone Field.
Unanticipated changes.
"Shortly after you left, Guo Zhongxiong first appointed Chen Zixiao as the inspector of Caocheng, and then Guo Junpan, Pan Chenghu, the deputy commander of the Xiang Army of the Caocheng Inspection Department, and the new camp manager Zhu Xiaotong is a member of Cai Qing's disciples..."
