Standalone Northern and Southern Dynasties

Chapter 471 Rebellion is not easy
However, before Liu Lingzhu's coalition of powerful families set out, something unexpected happened that day.

Rumors suddenly began to spread in the army. These rumors were aimed at sowing discord among several leading families in Zhuo County. Many of the contents sounded absurd and ridiculous, but they were plausible.

The news spread quickly in the army. Although several large families came out to refute the rumors under the mediation of Liu Lingzhu, they also swore an oath of blood in front of the entire army to show their complete trust in each other.

However, the seeds of discord have been sown internally, and many large families have begun to make other plans.

The reason is very simple. It is normal for these noble families to be indecisive. Although the rumors are false, many of the contents are known to the upper echelons of the major families. So the person who spread these rumors is intriguing.

Or maybe other families are dissatisfied and secretly use these rumors to slander their opponents.

Or maybe someone has already defected to Su Ze and spread rumors to disrupt the morale of the army.

No matter which situation it is, it shows that the newly formed Yan Wang Army is already riddled with problems.

However, these big families were suspicious of each other and did not guess that the rumors were spread by Jia Zhi.

Jia Zhi just happened to have a servant named Su Zang under his command who had the negative attribute "gossip" and liked to gossip and stir up trouble in the county government.

Jia Zhi discovered Su Zang's talent and ordered him to infiltrate Lu's private soldiers. After being recruited into the military camp, Su Zang began to display his talent and made up all kinds of outrageous rumors based on the conflicts between several major families.

Some of the rumors contained love-hate stories among the upper echelons of several major families, especially several erotic and vulgar jokes carefully compiled by Su Zang, which spread in the army at a speed far beyond imagination.

There is no other way. The military camp is boring and these jokes are the most entertaining stories. Especially when they involve the big guys who are usually high and mighty, it makes people even happier.

Seeing that his jokes were spreading quickly in the army, Su Zang thought of several new jokes and waited to tell them to his comrades after nightfall.

At this moment, Su Zang suddenly heard the sound of a gong for an emergency assembly.

He hurried to the parade ground, thinking he was late, only to find that less than half of the men in the camp had arrived.

The lieutenant in the camp was also a descendant of the Lu family. Before all the soldiers arrived, he said drunkenly:

"The King of Yan has issued an order that if rumors are allowed to spread in the army, anyone who spreads them will be punished with ten military sticks. If they do it again, they will be punished with twenty sticks and expelled from the camp!"

Su Zang was shocked. He was just a follower of green quality. His overall quality was not high and his psychological quality was not up to standard. He was the most excited about spreading rumors yesterday. If someone reported him, he would be finished.

But the comrades around him seemed to be fine, so Su Zang finally breathed a sigh of relief.

The lieutenant colonel was unwilling to waste time talking to these soldiers. He was a child of a noble family and disdained to associate with these low-level soldiers. Holding a position was just a way to accumulate merit, and he would be promoted soon anyway.

After conveying King Yan's order, the lieutenant left with his entourage. Only then did the soldiers arrive one after another.

After the lieutenant left, the soldiers surrounded Su Zang.

"Zang Lang, do you still remember yesterday's story?"

"We haven't finished talking about Mr. Lu and Mrs. Qi last time!"

"Yes, yes! If you don't finish your words, we will have to hand you over!"

Everyone started to cheer, and Su Zang immediately felt relieved. He then told everyone his newly-written joke in a vivid way, and soon the military camp was filled with cheerful laughter.

Three days later, they finally managed to suppress the rumors by defeating a few military leaders who spread them. However, Liu Lingzhu and Lu Wenwei were already exhausted.

No one expected that rebellion would be so difficult.

Everyone is rebelling these days, why don’t others have the same difficulties?

Liu Lingzhu thought of Su Ze, Erzhu Rong, and more recently Xianyu Xiuli, Ge Rong, Du Luozhou, and Han Lou. Why was it so difficult for him to even form a county when he rebelled, while others could get people from all over the country to respond as soon as they rebelled, and take over entire states and counties in an instant?
Am I too incompetent? Or are others too good?
Liu Lingzhu no longer had the heart to think about this problem because there was some even worse news in front of him.

The news has come from several surrounding counties, including Yi County (the county on the banks of the Yi River where Jing Ke bid farewell to him), Fangcheng County, and Beiping County.

The county officials sent by Su Ze were well prepared, and all the assassins had been captured. The Beiping County Magistrate Hulu Guihan even turned around and killed several big families in the city, and then led the county soldiers to counterattack Zhuo County!

What happened to the nationwide response?

Why were these county magistrates on guard?

Liu Lingzhu once again thought of the rumors circulating in the army. Could there really be a traitor?

Once the seeds of doubt are planted, the suspicion will never end.

The alliance of these families was originally relatively fragile. In history, Liu Lingzhu also started his rebellion with the support of the Youzhou nobles. He did not encounter any obstacles and quickly took over Youzhou.

However, this time, they encountered setbacks just after the uprising, and many families began to retreat.

Liu Lingzhu and Lu Wenwei gritted their teeth, the arrow was on the string and had to be shot.

Others still have a way out, but as the King of Yan and the Prime Minister of Yan, they absolutely have no way out.

However, it has been five days since the uprising, and Liu Lingzhu has not even been able to take over the county government in Zhuozhou.

The two of them decided that if they could achieve some success in their rebellion, others would follow them. The reason why starting a business is the most difficult is that you have to do it yourself. Only when you have conquered a kingdom yourself will others follow your lead and invest.

Su Ze relied on summoned followers and the old team of the imperial guards to start his business, while Erzhu Rong relied on the accumulation of several generations of the Erzhu family to start his business.

Liu Lingzhu and Lu Wenwei could only use the Lu family's most powerful strength now and ordered Lu Kan to give up attacking the county government office and lead his troops to attack the neighboring Yi County.

Liu Lingzhu summoned all the generals and mobilized them, saying:

"As long as we take Yi County, people from all over Youzhou will come to respond, and we will be able to drive out Su's fake officials!"

This time, Liu Lingzhu's mobilization finally had some effect. The major families also gathered some private soldiers, and finally a total of 3,000 people, under the leadership of Lu Kan, fought against the county soldiers who came back to Han to kill Hulu.

Of course, Liu Lingzhu had been plotting for a long time and it still caused some chaos. Although all the attempts to assassinate the county magistrate failed, the county magistrate was injured and the county town was out of control.

But what made Su Ze happy was that this group of Chongwen Pavilion students had withstood the test. None of them abandoned the city and fled. Even when the county fell into chaos, they were able to hold on to the county government office and wait for reinforcements.

Among all the county officials, the most outstanding performances were Hulu Guihan and Jia Zhi.

Su Ze was very pleased. It was a great fortune that among a group of scholars in Chongwen Pavilion, there were one or two promising ones.

After learning about Liu Lingzhu's plan, it was only a matter of time before the rebellion in Youzhou was quelled.

If Murong Shaozong didn't even have this ability, he wouldn't be worthy of being recorded in history books.

For Su Ze, being able to find two seeds for the future from Liu Lingzhu's childish rebellion was already a great gain.

Both Jia Zhi and Hulu Gui Han were capable of at least governing a county. In fact, no matter what era it was, people who were capable of doing this job were rare.

Today is not the peaceful era of later generations. The modern government has a large number of subordinates and think tanks. The talents who can focus on one side now encounter new and difficult problems every day. They really need to be both civil and military, and have courage and strategy.

In addition to serving as a touchstone, Liu Lingzhu also effectively solved the problem of the wealthy families in Youzhou.

Moreover, this time the rebellion led by the Lu family of Fanyang implicated almost all the families in Youzhou.

Su Ze sneered. He had been thinking about how to deal with this group of guys and implement the Equal Field System and the Fubing System in Youzhou. Now that the other party has handed him the knife, he can only be rude.

The Lu family of Fanyang alone occupied nearly one-tenth of the land in Zhuo County. It is unknown how many soldiers could be granted land.

And their land can be used to grant farmland to soldiers who have made contributions in suppressing the rebellion.

Just when he was about to consolidate Youzhou, Liu Lingzhu presented him with such a great gift. Su Ze really wanted to thank him.

In short, the power of the local nobles in Youzhou had been weakened by the Six Garrisons Rebellion and Han Lou, and they could not cause much trouble.

The focus is still on the Khitans in the north.

In the history before Su Ze traveled through time, Khitan did rise again after more than ten years, but was beaten back to the tribal era by Emperor Wenxuan of Northern Qi, Gao Yang, who was keen on showing off his military merits in the north.

It is not surprising that the Khitans came out early, but dealing with them is much more difficult than dealing with Liu Lingzhu.

The living environment in Northeast China is harsh, and the ethnic minorities living in this land are all very ruthless.

As for dealing with the rising alien race in the Northeast, the best way is to defeat them in one battle.

If the war turns into a terrible one like the one at the end of the Ming Dynasty, it will become an abscess with continuous bleeding.

However, these ethnic minorities in Northeast China are faced with the problem of running away if they cannot win the battle.

Once they are allowed to escape to the green mountains and white waters of the north, the combat effectiveness of the expeditionary soldiers who are unfamiliar with the terrain will be reduced.

As long as we drag it on until winter, we can rely on General Dong's power to defeat the army.

This is the Jurchen script of the late Ming Dynasty.

The Ming Dynasty can win countless times, but losing just once is a loss it cannot afford.

As for the current situation, Su Ze sent Murong Shaozong to Youzhou and stayed in Dingzhou himself, just because he did not want to use his precious military forces in Youzhou.

According to intelligence from Luoyang, Erzhu Rong was preparing to march to Hulao in March.

All we can say is that Yuwen Tai’s political talent was indeed outstanding.

He must have realized his own strategic intention, so he proposed to build Shanhaiguan in Linyu to establish a defense line against the Khitan first.

Stop the Khitans from plundering southwards, test the Khitans' strengths and weaknesses, find out the internal situation and topography of the Khitans, and make full preparations for the future war to destroy the country.

What surprised Su Ze was that Gao Huan, as Erzhu Rong's reinforcement, had also crossed the sea from Qingzhou to the north a few days ago.

Will this pair of fateful rivals fight again in Shanhaiguan?
Su Ze turned his attention to Shuzhong, and another pair of fateful rivals began to confront each other.

(End of this chapter)