Shangshui County was originally a small county on the southern border of the Wei State. It covered an area of less than two miles, and the number of residents in the county was not very large in the past. It was similar to Yuxian County, with only a few hundred or nearly a thousand households. What kind of big county is it?
This is no wonder, after all, on the southeast side of Shangshui County, about ten or twenty miles downstream of Shangshui River, are Xu County and Xiangcheng in Pingyu County, Chu State.
Therefore, several years ago, Shangshui County had always been a key target of harassment by Pingyu Lord Xiong Hu.
Fortunately, in the southeast of Shangshui County, there are many tributaries of Shangshui. These tributaries wash away the soil, leaving the Shangshui area with mudflats, overgrown reeds and weeds, and inconvenient roads, forming a natural obstacle that is easy to defend but difficult to attack. No less than Zhaoling, which has the danger of Luohe River.
However, compared with Zhaoling County, the layout of Shangshui County is too small. After all, it is just a small county with a population of only a few hundred or thousands of households. Therefore, although there is a risk of geographical advantage, in Chuyang City at that time When Jun Xiongtuo and Pingyu Jun Xiong Hu led their troops to attack Wei, it was inevitable that the county would be captured in the first wave of Chu army's offensive.
Nowadays, the appearance of Shangshui County is very different, because now there are hundreds of thousands of Chu people who defected to Wei State, with tens of thousands of households, and the population has increased dozens or even hundreds of times compared to that year. .
If it weren't for the imperial household department transporting grain from time to time, Shangshui County would really not be able to afford the grain consumption of hundreds of thousands of people.
For this reason, Zhao Hongrun owed a huge sum of money to the Ministry of Revenue.
On March 9, Zhao Hongrun arrived in Shangshui.
At this time, the Qingya people from Yingkang and the Youma people from Youma also moved to Shangshui one after another, which added nearly 10,000 people to Shangshui County.
As a belated reward, Zhao Hongrun ordered the Shang Shui Army to repair for five days. It was said to be repairing, but in fact it was a holiday for the soldiers of the Shang Shui Army.
Mainly the main force of the merchant navy led by Wu Ji. After all, this army followed Zhao Hongrun to conquer Sanchuan and was far away from his family. Therefore, now that the war was over, Zhao Hongrun simply gave them a holiday so that they could reunite with their relatives.
After giving the Shang Shui Army a holiday, Zhao Hongrun sent someone to summon Ying Kang and Yuma, and summoned them to the mansion of the Yangtou family in the county.
After all, in the mansions of nobles such as Shangshui, only the Yangyan family has some relationship with Zhao Hongrun. After all, the little girl Yangyanxing always regards herself as "Zhao Hongrun's woman". Now even in the capital of Daliang, there are many People directly called Yang Yanxing the young lady of Prince Su's Mansion, let alone in Shangshui.
Arriving at the residence of the Yang Yan Yi family, Yang Yan Xing arranges the residences of Miss Su's master and servants, as well as sisters Oona, Mi Jiang, and Mi Rui, and then introduces them to her parents.
On Zhao Hongrun's side, he first met with Ying Kang and Yuma in the front hall of Yang Shi Yi's house, accompanied by Yang Shi Tao.
In fact, at this moment, Yingkang's Qingya people and Youma's Youma people have almost all moved outside the city, but they don't dare to enter the city rashly. After all, Shangshui County is Zhao Hongrun's territory, and they are also the latter. The subordinates of the leader and the people under his rule can no longer make their own decisions as before, and must listen to Zhao Hongrun's opinion in everything.
This is what the Green Crows and Black Crows have lost, their autonomy.
"Didn't His Highness Prince Su build a mansion in Shangshui?"
After greeting Zhao Hongrun, Ying Kang asked curiously.
Because according to what he thought, Shangshui was the territory of King Su, Zhao Hongrun, so of course there should be Prince Su's Mansion in Shangshui County. However, Zhao Hongrun stayed at the house of the Yangyan family, which surprised Ying Kang greatly.
.
"Don't mention it, I feel angry when you mention it."
Zhao Hongrun shook his head helplessly.
Ying Kang didn't know that, in fact, there was Prince Su's Mansion in Shangshui County, but it was still under construction.
It was built by a group of emerging aristocrats in Shangshui County, headed by Yang Shitao, who pooled their money to build it for Zhao Hongrun. It is said that generals Gu Liangwei and Wuma Jiao of the Shangshui Army also had a hand in it.
But when it came to Prince Su's Mansion, Zhao Hongrun felt a little angry.
Because Yang Yantao and his group of nobles, as well as Gu Liangwei, Wuma Jiao and others, when Zhao Hongrun led his army to conquer Sanchuan, they actually re-planned Shangshui County and asked the people in the county to move to the city.
In addition, they attempted to build Prince Su's Mansion on the original basis of the old county seat.
Yes, you heard me right, Yang Shitao actually planned to build the former site of Shangshui County into a palace for Prince Su.
Prince Su's Mansion covers an area of nearly two miles!
Could this be giving him Zhao Hongrun eye drops?
Before summoning Ying Kang and Youma, Zhao Hongrun had already scolded Yang Tontao. He was also preparing to call General Gu Liangwei and Wuma Jiao who were in the military camp after the Green Crows and Youma were arranged.
Come up to them and scold them again.
No wonder Zhao Hongrun was so frightened and angry. After all, how big was the palace in Daliang, the royal capital?
Zhao Hongrun's Prince Su's Mansion actually occupies an area close to the Daliang Palace. How does this make the government and the public view Zhao Hongrun?
Although Zhao Hongrun also understood that the purpose of Yang Shitao's people was just to please him, Zhao Hongrun, but in this way, Zhao Hongrun was really frightened.
Apparently he was already surrounded by rumors in Daliang, the royal capital. Many people were wondering whether he intended to get involved in the throne. In order to avoid the rumors, Zhao Hongrun came to Shangshui. It turned out that Yang Shitao and his gang were plotting to kill people in Shangshui County.
He built a palace with an area comparable to the Daliang Palace. Is this because he was afraid that the rumors around Zhao Hongrun would not spread enough?
What's more, Zhao Hongrun felt that Prince Su's Mansion in Daliang was too empty. How could he allow Yang Yantao and others to build him a palace that was dozens of times larger than Prince Su's Mansion in Daliang City?
"A bunch of well-fed guys!... If you have the time, how about building a city wall?"
"..."
Seeing that Zhao Hongrun was angry because of the Prince Su's Mansion in Shangshui County, which was still under preparation, Ying Kang and Yuma looked at each other. They could not understand the worries of such a high-ranking noble: all the nobles in the world disliked their own mansion.
It's small, not impressive enough, and there are actually some nobles who think the mansion is too big.
Well, by the way, the King Su in front of me is one of them.
"Okay, let's not talk about this for now, you two come over and take a look."
After ending the topic about Prince Su's Mansion, Zhao Hongrun called Ying Kang and Yuma to the table. Immediately, Shen Yu, the chief of the clan guard beside him, took out a map from his arms and laid it flat on the table.
This map is the map of the Shangshui area that Zhao Hongrun asked for from Yang Shitao just now.
Since the old Shangshui County was not able to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of Shangshui people, from April last year to the end of last year, Yang Yantao, Gu Liangwei, and Wuma Jiao successively moved to Shangshui County.
Three cities were built within it.
Well, to be precise, they are still just three cities under construction plan. As for the city walls and other defensive facilities, they have almost not been started yet, so to put it bluntly, they are no different from three large villages.
As for the three cities under construction plan, Zhao Hongrun named them "Gu Liang", "Wuma" and "Wu" respectively with a stroke of his pen. They were named after the surnames of the three current generals of the Shang Shui Army.
After all, since the construction of Shangshui County, apart from Yang Yantao, the three generals Gu Liangwei, Wuma Jiao and Wu Ji have contributed the most. Zhao Hongrun does not mind. While giving actual material rewards to these three loyal generals,
It also gives them fame and gain, allowing them to gain both fame and fortune.
This will let the world know that the Wei State has always been generous with rewards for talents who defect to the Wei State.
Because in Zhao Hongrun's view, if you want to make Wei more powerful, relying on the domestic Wei people alone is far from enough. After all, his Wei State's territory only occupies a small part of the Central Plains. On the land that does not belong to the Wei State,
, there are still countless talents.
If those talents can be recruited to the Wei State, then the Wei State will become more and more powerful, and even eventually become the overlord of the Central Plains.
"..."Grain Liang", "Wuma", and "Wu", this is the city that Shangshui has been preparing to build in recent years, although the city wall has not yet been built. Oh, by the way, there is also this "solid wall"
』.”
Zhao Hongrun pointed to the place marked with the words "solid wall" on the map.
"Solid Wall" is not so much an old city as it is a garrison. It was once the garrison where the Fenxing fortress army was stationed in Shangshui County.
Zhao Hongrun knew something about this.
It turned out that Xu Yin, the general at Fenxing Fortress, saw that Pingyu Lord Xiong Hu sent troops from Shangshui County to harass the Wei border from time to time, so he ordered his soldiers to build a fortress in the south of Shangshui County. This fortress
The name is called "solid wall".
The reason why this fortress is called "Solid Wall" is because in General Xu Yin's original plan, this fortress will eventually be connected to Fenxing Fortress.
Yes, General Xu Yin plans to start work again to build the city wall on the southern border of Wei State. Build a Great Wall from Yangzhai in the west to Shangshui in the east to completely block Xiong Tuo, the king of Yangcheng, from the Wei State border.
outside.
But later, it was very embarrassing. General Xu Yin was repairing and found that he had no money in his hand, so he went to the Ministry of Revenue to ask for it.
Even though today's Ministry of Revenue has a stable source of income from trade with Sanchuan, it looks like it has a lot of money. It no longer cares about the losses caused by Zhao Hongrun's transportation merchants and navy soldiers. At that time, the Ministry of Revenue was still very stingy.
, they tried their best to reduce the military expenditure of the Sixth Battalion, how could they give General Xu Yin another sum of money to build the Great Wall?
As a result, General Xu Yin's "Strengthening the Wall Plan" was put on hold indefinitely, leaving the "Strengthening the Wall" as a bare fortress in an awkward position.
Last year, after the Shangshui Army entered Shangshui County, Xu Yin handed over the defense of "Fixed Wall" to the Shangshui Army.
Therefore, compared with "Gu Liang", "Wuma", and "Wu", it is the "solid wall" fortress, which has defensive facilities such as city walls. Therefore, Zhao Hongrun plans to transform it into a city for trading water.
Diversion of residents within the county.
After introducing the geographical environment of Shangshui County to Ying Kang and Yuma in detail, Zhao Hongrun handed the map to Ying Kang and asked him to determine the location of the Hidden Thieves Village of the Blue Crows.
After all, Zhao Hongrun was not a hidden thief and did not understand the ways. It was better to leave this matter to Ying Kang himself.
As for Yuma, he made a request to live near Shangshui County.
After another tea session, Ying Kang and Yuma said goodbye and left.
Just when Zhao Hongrun was about to visit Yang Yanxing's family deep in the mansion, Zongwei Gao Kuo hurried in, clasped his fists and reported: "Your Highness, Xiong Hu is here."
"Pingyu Lord Xiong Hu?"
Zhao Hongrun was stunned for a moment and thought to himself, what is he doing here?